A Canadian flag flies in front of the Peace Tower on Parliament Hill in Ottawa in March 2017 in a file photo. (REUTERS/Chris Wattie)
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Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canada “had a better pandemic” than other western countries.
“We had a better pandemic than many of our peer countries, with fewer deaths, with lower levels of economic disruption, with greater social cohesions than many other places,” said Trudeau at a press conference on Feb. 17, as first reported by Blacklock’s Reporter.
He was addressing the media following the release of the Public Order Emergency Commission’s final report on his government’s invocation of the Emergencies Act in February 2022 to clear the Freedom Convoy protest opposing federal COVID-19 vaccine mandates and restrictions.
“We will continue to listen to all voices across this wonderfully diverse country that isn’t just diverse geographically or culturally or in origins, but also in perspectives.”
The prime minister said listening “goes in both directions.”
“We hear their skepticism around science but they need to also hear our belief in science. These are conversations we need to have,” he said.
Convoy organizers have said that they wanted to have a dialogue with Trudeau but were not given an audience during their time in Ottawa.
Trudeau did not cite any source for his “better pandemic” claim.
A webpage examining how COVID-19 fatalities differ by country, provided by U.S.-based John Hopkins University of Medicine, listed Canada among “twenty countries currently most affected by COVID-19 worldwide.”
The “Mortality Analyses” report shows Canada’s COVID death rate at 134 per 100,000 population. This is higher than the death rate in Norway (94), Australia (75), Cuba (74), Taiwan (74), South Korea (66), Iceland (62), Kuwait (60), Japan (57), New Zealand (53), Singapore (29), and Saudi Arabia (28).
Canada’s rate is lower when compared with the United States (339), the UK (323), Italy (311), Russia (266), France (254), Sweden (234), Germany (201), Ireland (175), Switzerland (164), Finland (160), and Israel (142).
According to the report, Canada’s observed case-fatality ratio—the number of deaths per 100 confirmed cases—is 1.1 percent, reflecting the country’s over 51,000 deaths that have resulted from more than 4,500,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19.
‘Fringe Minority’
Trudeau said choosing not to be vaccinated against COVID-19 doesn’t mean someone doesn’t believe in science.
“Individuals make decisions for themselves and we’ll always respect that, but those individuals who deliberately chose to amplify falsehoods and put their fellow citizens at risk, those were things that a government needs to stand firmly against,” he said.
The efficacy of COVID vaccines remains a contested issue among medical professionals, with one side arguing that the shots protect against the virus and the other side warning of long-term side effects and citing cases of vaccine injuries such as myocarditis or even deaths.
Asked if he has any regrets calling the Freedom Convoy protesters a “fringe minority,” Trudeau said he wished he had “phrased it differently.”
The prime minister had dismissed the protesters as a “small fringe minority … who are holding unacceptable views” and who don’t “represent the views of Canadians” during a press conference on Jan. 26, 2022.
Commissioner Paul Rouleau said in his Feb. 17 report that the Liberal government was justified in invoking the Emergencies Act but that Trudeau’s way of talking inflamed the protesters.
“This served to energize the protesters, hardening their resolve and further embittering them toward government authorities,” Rouleau wrote.
Two Liberal MPs in February 2022 publicly criticized their government for politicizing the pandemic and using the issue of vaccination to divide Canadians.
Former Liberal finance minister Bill Morneau also said in January this year that Trudeau shouldn’t have used vaccine mandates as a political wedge while running for re-election in the 2021 federal election.
Tara MacIsaac contributed to this report.