COVID Omicron cases in Canada are coming down but they are still higher than any previous wave of the pandemic. Deaths peaked around January 29, 2022 but are still higher that the second and third waves of the Pandemic.Those numbers of course pale to the over 900,000 who have died in America.
Canadians are done with COVID but COVID is not done with them. The virus can not be wished away with the notion of individual freedom.
The “Freedom Convoy“, a large protest in Ottawa, Ontario, that began with truck drivers opposing a cross-border vaccine mandate continues to snarl traffic and disrupt everyday life in the Canadian capital more than a week after it began.
Ottowa is now under a state of emergency. On February 7, 2022, some drivers blocked traffic on the Ambassador Bridge, a key crossing between Windsor, Ontario, and Detroit, CBC reported. They also got the backing of more than 100 Alaska truck drivers who rallied in support of the convoy, according to the Anchorage Daily News.
Some protesters say they’re staying until all public health mandates are lifted, while others have called for the dissolution of the current government, as NPR‘s Emma Jacobs reported. In addition, signs for QAnon, right-wing militias and Confederate and Nazi flags have also appeared among the protesters, Jacobs said. Ottawa police made several arrests over the weekend, seized fuel from some protesters and issued more than 450 tickets. A judge ruled that truckers couldn’t sound their thunderous horns for 10 days.
Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, who is recovering from COVID-19, has said that engaging the military in response to the protests is “not in the cards right now.”