# Covid Vaccines in Canada **URL:** \ **Category:** The Quarantine Zone\ **Tags:** covid-quarantine\ **Created:** [March 2, 2021, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089 "2021-03-02T04:00:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [March 14, 2021, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/41 "2021-03-14T23:31:43Z")
A committee will be formed **immediately** , travelling the country from coast to coast. Soliciting the views of ordinary Canadians such as yourself, and writing down a concise summary of these opinions in a big book with leather bindings and a fancy pen to be consulted _de tempus in tempo_ as the need arises and to commemorate the extreme importance of future preparedness for Canadians of every stripe and stratus. ---
**Author:** ![mistymage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mistymage/32/459_2.png) [@mistymage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mistymage)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2021, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/42 "2021-03-15T00:31:10Z")
Is that the one in the news that has caused blood clot problems? ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2021, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/43 "2021-03-15T02:00:58Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > What is likely to happen is it’ll be shuttled off to some underfunded working group and governments will largely ignore them. No one will take any responsibility or blame for the various failures. This worries me too. Something needs to be enshrined in law, it can’t be left to an administrative process. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2021, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/44 "2021-03-15T02:03:37Z")
> [@mistymage](#): > > Is that the one in the news that has caused blood clot problems? AstraZeneca has been linked, but there is evidence that it has caused coagulation issues. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2021, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/45 "2021-03-15T18:45:40Z")
I’d like to see that evidence. What I read was something like 20 or 50 cases each of DVT and pulmonary embolism in 17m doses. This is extraordinarily weak evidence of causation of conditions already greatly underdiagnosed in the general population, especially in the elderly who are being vaccinated. However, certainly AstraZeneca may not be being transparent. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2021, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/46 "2021-03-15T18:59:10Z")
> [@FinsToTheLeft](#): > > > [@mistymage](#): > > > > Is that the one in the news that has caused blood clot problems? > > AstraZeneca has been linked, but there is evidence that it has caused coagulation issues. I blame daylight saving time. AstraZeneca has been linked, but there is _NO_ evidence that it has caused coagulation issues. I was disputing @mistymage that it had caused the clotting issues. ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2021, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/47 "2021-03-15T19:06:38Z")
> [@Gorsnak](#): > > I like how an article entitled “The roots of Canada’s COVID-19 vaccine shortage go back decades” is a cite for this being all Trudeau’s fault. Albertans frequently blame Trudeau for not inventing time travel to solve all of their problems. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/48 "2021-03-18T04:20:55Z")
> [@EastUmpqua](#): > > I would think that the capacity to develop and manufacture vaccines would be an integral part of a national health care system. Nope. Our system is a single-payer for medical care provided by doctors and hospitals. It’s never been the case that the government controls all health care developments, like medicines or equipment. The government doesn’t develop medicines, or build x-ray or MRI machines. It it did, that truly would be a socialised central planning system. The various actors in the health care system buy health care products that they need on the open market, from the drug companies, the MRI companies, and so on. The purpose of the health care system is to deliver health care to patients, not to be in charge of the entire system of medicines and equipments. ---
**Author:** ![EastUmpqua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eastumpqua/32/6025_2.png) [@EastUmpqua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EastUmpqua)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/49 "2021-03-18T18:45:41Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > It’s never been the case that the government controls all health care developments, like medicines or equipment. I had an inaccurate understanding of Canada’s Health Care system when I started this thread. I still don’t understand why the Canadian government didn’t invest in domestic vaccine development and manufacture. And I’d like to be able to see my sister, who lives in Canada, this summer. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/50 "2021-03-18T19:04:32Z")
> [@EastUmpqua](#): > > I still don’t understand why the Canadian government didn’t invest in domestic vaccine development and manufacture. That is a separate question. I don’t know the answer. ---
**Author:** ![Gorsnak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gorsnak/32/7587_2.png) [@Gorsnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorsnak)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/51 "2021-03-18T19:58:13Z")
> [@EastUmpqua](#): > > I still don’t understand why the Canadian government didn’t invest in domestic vaccine development and manufacture. What time frame are you talking about here? The Canadian government _has_ invested heavily in both domestic vaccine development and domestic vaccine manufacture since the pandemic began. None of those investments have come to fruition yet. Well. Actually one of Canada’s early bets was the CanSino vaccine mentioned a few times upthread. Canada and China had jointly developed a SARS vaccine candidate that had made it into human trials, but couldn’t complete testing because SARS went away. Development of a modified version of that vaccine was jointly funded by China and Canada. Testing was to take place in both Canada and China, and the vaccine was to be produced in China. China used some made-up BS to stop the test batches at customs, and basically just screwed us over. This is probably due to the Meng Wanzhou affair. China has gone to ridiculous lengths to coerce Canada to violate our extradition treaty with the US ever since the US asked us to detain Meng and extradite her for alleged bank fraud relating to US trade sanctions against Iran. I see that the CanSino vaccine is has been approved for use by regulators in China, Mexico, and Pakistan. I’m not sure if it’s in mass production yet, but it has been one of the quickest vaccines to clear testing. There is also another purely domestic vaccine project in development, but it’s only in Phase 1 trials at the moment. As for domestic production, last summer construction was started on a new facility in Montreal, and in February Canada reached an agreement with Novavax (currently closing in on completing its Phase 3 trials) to license production of the Novavax vaccine in our facility. However, it won’t be complete till summer and we won’t see any mass production for a few months after that. If your question is why did we not have existing domestic vaccine production capability, as noted multiple times in this thread, the largest domestic manufacturer of vaccines in Canada lost its government funding 30 years ago during a round of fiscal austerity. The government of the day thought that it didn’t need to subsidize vaccine production because we would always be able to purchase vaccines from our allies. ---
**Author:** ![EastUmpqua](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eastumpqua/32/6025_2.png) [@EastUmpqua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EastUmpqua)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 8:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/52 "2021-03-18T20:18:48Z")
I’ve read the whole thread, I started it. I was responding to a recent question. > [@Gorsnak](#): > > What time frame are you talking about here? A time frame that would have given Canada the ability to develop and distribute a vaccine. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2021, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/53 "2021-03-21T16:41:17Z")
> [@FinsToTheLeft](#): > > Based on current estimates, we are only 3-4 weeks behind the US in achieving our goal of vaccinating every adult that wants a vaccine. How is that a complete failure? We are just about two weeks into this prediction. When it was made, Canada had vaccinated 6.7% of the population, and the US 28%… Today, the U.S. is at 35%, and Canada just about 9.5%. Not only are we not catching up, but the gap is widening. We only managed to vaccinate an additional 2.8% of the population in two weeks, while the U.S. vaccinated an additional 7%. At this rate, the U.S. will be at 100% in about nine weeks. Canada? About 35 weeks. Of course these rates won’t hold, but those estimates of us only being 3-4 weeks behind the U.S. are not looking very accurate. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2021, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/54 "2021-03-21T17:28:37Z")
> [@Sam\_Stone](#): > > At this rate, the U.S. will be at 100% in about nine weeks. Canada? About 35 weeks. Of course these rates won’t hold, but those estimates of us only being 3-4 weeks behind the U.S. are not looking very accurate. While I may have been a bit too off-the-cuff with that number, we are in a very different place on the curve than the US with mass vaccination clinics just having opened in Ontario. I believe we are closer to my prediction than that of Rick Hillier, a man so dedicated to the task of getting the province vaccinated that he is starting a new job in just over a week. The official Ontario plan shows Phase 3 not beginning until July: > **[COVID‑19 vaccines](https://www.ontario.ca/page/covid-19-vaccines)** > > Learn about Ontario’s vaccination program to help protect us against COVID-19 and how to book a vaccine. The XBB formulation of the COVID-19 vaccine and annual flu shots are now available to all eligible individuals aged 6 months and older. It is... The Federal plan for vaccine distribution shows 4.5 million doses distributed and an additional 10.5+ million Pfizer inbound by May 30, 3 million Moderna by April 30, and an unknown amount of Covishield/Astra either directly or from the US 1.5 million allocation to Canada. > **[Canada’s COVID-19 vaccine supply and donation strategy - Canada.ca](https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/diseases/coronavirus-disease-covid-19/vaccines/supply-donation.html)** > > Information on how Canada has procured its vaccines, managed the vaccine supply in country, and how vaccines are donated globally. News of the Jansen shipments would be helpful, since I am guessing most of that will go to primary care physicians, pharmacies, and mobile clinics. I expect that we will surpass the US vaccination rate by September not due to greater availability but due to excessive vaccine hesitancy in the US. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2021, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/55 "2021-03-21T19:31:33Z")
I really didn’t mean to call you out on that prediction - prediction is hard. The ones I made probably won’t be right either. I agree that Canada will surpass the U.S. vaccination rate at some point, because as they get closer to 100% the people left will be the ones most resistant to being vaccinated. Likewise, I expect the rate of vaccination in Canada to slow once we get near that point. Also, as the rest of the world gets vaccinated, more production will be available for us. But that still means we’re going to be among the last developed countries to vaccinate the population. This should be unacceptable to everyone. Also, I don’t thinkmit’s helpful to use promised vaccines in two months as evidence of anything getting better since the root problem is that we haven’t been getting the vaccines we were promised, despite buying 400 million doses and paying extra for expedited delivery. Somehow we still wound up shut out. That should also be unacceptable to everyone, and the causes of that should be investigated. I uust read that the U.S. has been considering sending us more vaccine again. That shoild help. ---
**Author:** ![Gorsnak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gorsnak/32/7587_2.png) [@Gorsnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorsnak)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2021, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/56 "2021-03-21T21:36:00Z")
They’re sitting on tens of millions of doses of AZ, which is not yet approved for use in the US, and are magnanimously allowing 4 million (1.5M to us, 2.5M to Mexico) to be exported. It will help, in the sense that every bit helps, but it’s not going to have a particularly notable impact. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2021, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/57 "2021-03-23T21:19:57Z")
> [@FinsToTheLeft](#): > > The Federal plan for vaccine distribution shows 4.5 million doses distributed and an additional 10.5+ million Pfizer inbound by May 30, Given that just last week they suddenly announced the weekly allocation for that week would be about half what they’d forecast, I would not bank on those numbers. > [@](#): > > I expect that we will surpass the US vaccination rate by September not due to greater availability but due to excessive vaccine hesitancy in the US. The reason Canada will surpass the US rate by September will be because by then the US will have long since vaccinated all eligible adults who want one, and the pandemic will have largely died off there. > [@](#): > > While I may have been a bit too off-the-cuff with that number, we are in a very different place on the curve than the US with mass vaccination clinics just having opened in Ontario At the rates of allocation you yourself have said the feds are promising, there is little reason to have mass vaccination clinics anyway, because they won’t have vaccines. 400,000 vaccines a week is less than 60,000 a day. Ontario was hitting that number last week, maxing out at over 61,000 on Friday, and in fact surpassed fifty thousand _the Friday before_. For the week of March 13-19 inclusive Ontario distributed 357,689 vaccines and could do over 400,000 without the (fairly few) mass clinics it has, which really didn’t account for very many vaccines administered anyway, so far. The capability of pharmacies, after hours clinics and family physicians to administer vaccines has barely been touched. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2021, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/58 "2021-03-26T16:57:15Z")
Ontario got its Friday shipment today, from what the numbers tell me. It also vaccinated over 80,000 people so far today, so there’s only a week’s supply left. In effect, given the supply plan, this is as fast as the province can go. So at this rate, we’ll all be vaccinated by Christmas. Not including kids. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2021, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/59 "2021-03-26T17:21:06Z")
This is going to kill people. As of yesterday, U.S. covid cases were consistently falling for weeks while ours have been ticking up. Rho in the U.S is below 1, as they have vaccinated 38% of the population. Canada is well above 1, as we have only vaccinated 11%. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [March 26, 2021, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089/60 "2021-03-26T17:29:06Z")
Help is on the way: Health Canada is spending money to buy social media ‘influencers’ to sing the praises of Canada’s health system while pretending to be regular people with their own opinions. One of the goals of the program is “Demonstrate leadership and build HC and PHAC’s credibility as a trusted source of health information.” Because nothing builds trust and credibility like hidden propaganda paid for by the government. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/covid-vaccines-in-canada/934089.md?page=4)