{"id":3058,"date":"2020-03-29T17:15:24","date_gmt":"2020-03-29T20:15:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/?p=3058"},"modified":"2020-03-30T07:00:53","modified_gmt":"2020-03-30T10:00:53","slug":"will-history-repeat-itself-in-canada-during-pandemics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/2020\/03\/29\/will-history-repeat-itself-in-canada-during-pandemics\/","title":{"rendered":"Will history repeat itself in Canada during pandemics?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Human beings have the amazing capacity to learn from\ntheir past. Sadly, they are also notoriously known for sometimes letting \u201chistory\nrepeat itself\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This being said, by the own admission of our federal government\u2019s website (https:\/\/www.pc.gc.ca\/en\/culture\/clmhc-hsmbc\/res\/doc\/information-backgrounder\/espagnole-spanish<\/a>), Canada has founded a new bureaucratic layer (Department of Health) in 1919 as a response to critics for failing to provide resources and coordination to public health authorities across the country:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCriticized for failing to provide\nresources and coordination to public health authorities across the country, the\nfederal government responded to the crisis by founding the Department of Health\nin 1919. From then on, public health was a responsibility shared by all levels\nof government<\/em>\u201d (please see the last paragraph of the website above).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite all the best intentions of the world,\nlike anyone else, Bambi has seen outcomes of bureaucratic processes in her life.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Always frustrating, especially in pandemic times where rapid decision-making, implementation of decisions, and careful coordination (to avoid miscommunications, duplication, potentially harmful mistakes, etc.) matter more than ever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is surely not helpful to have a very large\ncountry with several jurisdictions. However, it is also an amazing opportunity to\ncooperate and learn from each other, to adjust decisions or mistakes that are\nbound to happen (and that\u2019s OK as we can learn from them). The idea is to have\na plan, to try it, and to adjust the stages, according to new daily input or damage\nin sectors or lives, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bambi does not have any issue with mistakes. Her\nproblem is more with ideology mainly, coupled with continuous vague answers to journalists\u2019\nimportant questions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr. Trudeau is right. We all need to\ncollaborate by staying in social isolation. However, what will he do to help\nprovinces\/territories\/communities OR companies (transportation, etc.) enforce measures\nimposed by the authorities? Concretely. Not a time to answer vaguely with\nbeautiful but empty words. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For instance, does he feel comfortable to support provinces, if some people from groups he considers racialized refuse to quarantine or others attend religious services (https:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/news\/canada\/toronto\/toronto-mosques-coronavirus-1.5508545<\/a> as seen in other countries in the middle east, including Lebanon and Israel? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What about groups from first nations communities? What if, may God forbid, the virus spreads there (e.g., in Montreal or elsewhere) and people do not collaborate?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On a different topic, why does he talk to us every\nsingle day? Would it help if he does it every second day? Or as needed? In the\nmeantime, we can listen to our own provincial authorities. And that way, he can\nrest to keep his energy alive for this pandemic (a lengthy marathon). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yesterday, Mr. Trudeau told kids that they\nare going to lead us through this crisis. Like him, Bambi loves children and was\nhappy to see him thinking of them. However, she found this platitude scary. How\ncan kids be leaders in pandemics? Why doesn\u2019t he be a leadership model for\nthem? They may be looking up to him for that. Who knows?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Children, adults of middle age, and\nespecially seniors, we are all eager to see more concrete actions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As his own (and our!) Sophie Gr\u00e9goire Trudeau\nwrote on her FB yesterday, to overcome this crisis, we need science AND\ncompassion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Science means public health experts and input\nfrom the \u201chealth soldiers\u201d on the ground. Emerging science on this new virus, yes,\nbut ultimately political decisions need to be taken, even in the absence of full\nknowledge. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr. Trudeau keeps talking about coordinating\nwith other countries. If she may, Bambi thinks that now more than ever, we need\nto see him putting us first. Before other countries or other ideologies. Please\nMr. Trudeau accept to be more flexible with your vision. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As far as compassion is concerned, when we\nhave it, we can naturally care for all people, including those in more dangerous\nregions and those more vulnerable. Related to the latter, Mr. Trudeau has all\nthe compassion needed. It should be easy then.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last but not least, compassion may also mean putting\naside one\u2019s older political ideologies (i.e. globalism mindset or other) and\nso-called values, as he told us yesterday during his press conference. He said\nthat he assures us that \u201cCanada will act according to our values\u201d. Bambi finds\nthis sentence rather scary, not reassuring. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr. Trudeau needs to be ready to innovate in actions and to surprise himself even with that. For example, the Hezbollah (which Bambi is clearly NOT fond of) understood this and is acting smartly: Their Chief even ordered mosques to close a while ago and said that \u201cthis combat is more dangerous than July war\u201d (2006 conflict with Israel, that left over 1200 civilians dead). We all know how much he hates Israel. If we forget, every now and then, he goes out publicly, reminding people of it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If Mr. Nasrallah is able to be \u201ccovidwise\u201d like that and forget even his own values (and raison d\u2019\u00eatre<\/em>, in a bankrupt country which was able to secure 1185 ventilators in a quick partnership between the public and private health sectors), why is Mr. Trudeau so attached to his \u201cvalues\u201d?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can he remain faithful to them in general (post-pandemic) but change his mindset now to help in protecting us?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Human beings have the amazing capacity to learn from their past. Sadly, they are also notoriously known for sometimes letting \u201chistory repeat itself\u201d. This being said, by the own admission of our federal government\u2019s website […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3058"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3058"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3058\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3069,"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3058\/revisions\/3069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bambisafkar.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}