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Did you need a comprehensive plan on how to overwhelm the heath care system? Burn out the doctors and Nurses? Just take the Jason Kenny’s Alberta Personal Responsibility Plan to heart. Our ideologically blinded Premier has condemned Alberta to a this entirely avoidable health care meltdown.
Most certainly personal responsibility is important and those Albertans who do the personally responsible thing are doing it. They social distance, they wear a mask, and avoid other people. Not surprisingly though, not everyone in the province fucking gets the fact that we are still in a pandemic (the most dangerous second wave, no less) and are royally fucking things up.
It is for these people we need the Public health orders and the stringent rules.
But no, Jason Kenny, has deferred to his neoliberal ‘populist’ base rather that epidemiological science – and here were are – healthcare staff burnt out, hospitals overloading, and now field hospitals to be staffed by non medical professionals to warehouse the dying.
As the doctor says – The Refrigerator trucks are next.
Some of the people in Calgary, Alberta feel that their fundamental rights and freedoms are being taken away from them. (Excerpts from cbc.ca)
“Hundreds marched through downtown Calgary on Saturday to protest against mandated masks and other public health measures intended to prevent the spread of COVID-19, the same day record highs in new cases and hospitalizations were reported in the province.
The protests, or “Walk for Freedom,” have been a weekly occurrence in the city and across the country for months, but Saturday was the first since the province’s 10-person limit on outdoor gatherings was announced on Tuesday.
“To see that there is a group of people in the Canadian population that is against masking, and to say that it infringes on their freedom, is taking the word out of context — it’s actually an insult on all those civil rights heroes who fought for freedom,” said Dr. Sajjad Fazel, a public health researcher at the University of Calgary.
“When we look at the word freedom, we’re talking about when people’s rights are taken away … you’re not allowed to drink and drive without any consequences, right? Everything has a consequence … when it’s for the public good, the scenario changes.”
So to protest the measures meant to inhibit the spread of the virus, we’re going yo hold a protest that will actively spread the virus? I realize the level of intelligence required to vote for false populist neoliberal demagogues isn’t particularly high but these actions, the hyper-spreading of a pandemic level virus, make me wonder if they need to take classes on how to walk and chew gum at the same time.
This from Health Canada.
Respiratory droplets are one of the main vectors of disease transmission. Yet the only masks being worn at the rally looked like this:
Which means the hospitalization rates in Alberta look like this:
This section of the demographic in Alberta are the ones that don’t believe in Public healthcare. The very same people they regularly demonize and vote against, are the ones keeping these fine individuals alive once the succumb to the virus. Unfortunately, this cannot go on forever, our doctors and nurses and the care they provide are rapidly burning-out finite resources.
“Dr. Lynora Saxinger, an infectious diseases expert at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, has warned that the weeks to come are likely to bring dangerous trends.
“In case anyone is wondering, we’re really in deep trouble in hospitals. This can’t continue,” Saxinger said on Twitter.
“This is a deadly pandemic, but we will be looking at excess deaths because of failure to take appropriate measures.”
Breaking point reached. I certainly hope our plucky freedom fighters respect the overtaxed doctors right to choose – especially when they have to make decisions as to who lives and who dies based on the lack of medical personnel and resources.
Greetings folks,
Insulation upgrades at homebase have thrown my routines and house into chaos.
Rest assured, I will be getting things sorted as soon as possible so DWR can get back on track.
Thanks,
The Arbourist
Is a sub gig worth the health of your family?
That main question that has been going through my head as of late, since school has started. I’ve been very lucky to be able to attend schools I know that also happen to have very stringent health protocols. But I won’t go somewhere new, where I don’t know the people or the lay of the land. Even with the familiarity and risk reduction, the chance to be infected isn’t zero.
The other side of the coin is, of course, I’m a big fan of eating and keeping up on the bills that, through some dark magic, continue to arrive and require my fiscal involvement even when deep into a world pandemic.
Being Canadian, I had access to the CERB, which while available provided income to keep the home-fires going and remain safely at home with minimal exposure. I haven’t been more proud of a Canadian Federal government for taking such bold steps to keep its population safe.
Yet, as the second wave comes, the fiscal reality of the government’s finances may dictate that there will be no relief available. It is very possible that the schools, and thus my employment, may become unavailable for an undetermined length of time.
So then given the uncertainty of future work should I take more risks and work now because no work may be the only option open in the future – but if I catch the virus now I may be out for months recuperating with added negative of possibly killing my vulnerable family members.
This sort of risk drenched future is hell on risk averse individuals such as myself.
I’ll do my best and hope that it is enough for whatever scenario we happen to fall into.
*sigh*
In Alberta our current government is off the rails. They are enacting austerity programs that are targeting the public sectors of our society during a pandemic. The quarrel with Alberta doctors over their working conditions during this exceptional time exemplifies the negligence of this UCP government.
This same radical right United Conservative government laid off thousands of Educational Assistants and support staff during the pandemic as well. The pattern is clear. The UCP are starving each of the public sectors of our society of the funds and people necessary for them to function efficiently. The next round of bullshit will be point out how these same gutted public sectors are not doing a good job and therefore must be replaced with private, more efficient, systems of delivery.
The UCP of Alberta are taking plays from the very first page Disaster Capitalism’s playbook. They are pushing through reactionary anti-education, anti-worker, anti-public health, reforms in the legislator at a marathon rate with essentially no debate. Albertan’s will be waking up to a very different set of ground rules in society, and most of said rules will be making their lives marginally worse.
Speaking of marginally worse, the contract for Alberta Teachers is up on August 30th. There will be no joy at the negotiating table this year, let me assure you. Austerity will be the only option – while we generously fund pipelines to nowhere – for Alberta Teachers.
Plastic shields for students? Netherlands is doing it. Alberta is not.
Concomitantly, Teachers will be asked to perform their duties under conditions that are directly hazardous to not only their students’ health, but theirs and their families as well. No additional funding for pandemic measures is on the table for the opening of the school year. No PPE, no classroom caps of 15, no additional cleaning personal or cleaning routines will be available. Teachers will be expected to take up the pandemic slack, as do ‘the best they can’ with the dangerous circumstances mandated by the UCP government.
This is unacceptable. Teachers should not have to unreasonably risk their lives and the lives of their families working in unsafe conditions. Is it just to expect teachers to be responsible for the death of their aging parents, or young children because of the government’s mandated unsafe working conditions in the schools?
Alberta teachers will not get, as in the previous agreements, another cent more in wages. Cost of living be damned. We expect that, especially with this government that is so completely beholden to private sector; especially Oil and Gas. The continued existence of the white elephant Energy War Room more than proves this egregious bias, the fact that it continues to exist during the pandemic will be one of the darker stains on this government’s legacy.
Wages aside, it is not reasonable for Alberta Teachers to risk their lives (and their families) to perform their duties. We are being set up to be the at the very nexus of the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. The situation, as currently mandated, is a untenable situation.
We must seriously consider a strike because our government seems unwilling or unable to adequately protect the students and teachers of this province. We should also consider coordinating with healthcare professionals because this government is serious about dismantling our public systems, and we need to present a united front that is too big to fail and cannot be punitively,and in piecemeal, legislated back to work (which will happen).
We let this happen at the ballot box, and now the grave consequences of voting in a American style government with a unhealthy privatization fetish, are here. We cannot sit back throw up our hands and somehow think that students and teachers dying at school because of the malfeasance of the government is in anyway okay. We are better than that as a teachers and as Albertans.
Signed,
A very concerned Alberta School Teacher.
@albertateachers
@rachelnotley
@albertandp
@ucp
@edmontonjournal
@adrianalagrange
The second wave of the pandemic now has a date. The beginning of the school year.
“The Alberta government is targeting a return to “near-normal” conditions with students returning to classrooms across the province for the beginning of the 2020-21 school year, Education Minister Adriana LaGrange says.
“Our goal is to get us back to normal learning as soon as possible,” LaGrange said Wednesday at news conference. “We are targeting a return to new-normal operations with some health measures in place.”
LaGrange laid out three scenarios that have been part of the planning for weeks now.
The first scenario would see near-normal operations resume with students returning to daily in-school classes with some health measures…”
Wow. We’re just gonna throw the kids back into the mix.
“Jason Schilling, president of the Alberta Teachers’ Association, said there are outstanding questions about safety.
“If you have a look at staffing as well, as teachers can’t spend the day cleaning their classrooms because they’ll be busy teaching, and if we have students that are in cohorts that are expected to be socially distanced, how is that going to work in some of our classrooms where we have 30 or 40 students? And are they going to split those grades and then hire more teachers?” he said.
“Unbelievable to me that we would move forward on a plan to restart school without making sure that it is adequately funded and that everything that needs to be in place for students, teachers and staff and the broader community, for that matter, are safe.”
Oh, and masks won’t be mandatory.
“LaGrange says wearing masks to school will not be mandated for either staff or students.
“From what Dr. [Deena] Hinshaw has been advising us, the data shows that particularly in young children that it is not something that is required.”
Students or staff who choose to wear a mask may do so, but there is no standalone funding for this type of thing.”
Yep. Looking forward to the second wave.
No public celebrations or fireworks in Edmonton this year. But that’s okay, eh… :)
bleatmop
Mystro
The Arbourist
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