Pushing Past Pandemic Public Policy Pressures

By the time anyone reads this, it is incredibly plausible that Albertans will know of the provincial government’s plan to begin once again lifting restrictions.

At the time this article was in the research phase, public knowledge (as indicated by Premier Jason Kenney) was that the province had reached the peak of the Omicron wave, meaning we could reasonably expect restrictions begin to be lifted by the end of March. The Restrictions Exemption Program was among those specifically mentioned.

Shortly thereafter, we were told that the end of February was the most likely time we could expect to see easement.

Late last week, it then turned into “very soon, likely within days” for what we are not supposed to call a vaccine passport. We were also told during a Facebook Live from Premier Kenney that nearly all public health restrictions could be gone sometime later this month.

“After two years of this, we simply cannot continue to rely on the blunt instrument of damaging restrictions as that as a primary tool to cope with a disease that will likely be with us for the rest of our lives.”

Alberta is not the only province signaling that they are prepared to begin softening public health measures in an effort to return to some semblance of normalcy. Our eastern-neighbour Saskatchewan has announced they will begin to reduce measures this week as well. Both appear to be following the lead of the United Kingdom and Denmark whom started taking similar steps at the end of January and beginning of February.

This will be Alberta’s second attempt at a safe reopening, following the ultimately unsuccessful Best Summer Ever that kicked off on Canada Day 2021. As we are all but certain restrictions are to be lifted, we will take a look at how the political landscape has influenced both of our restriction relaxations.

Best Summer Ever

We all remember the narrative. Open for summer – open for good. At the time, there was plenty of reason for optimism that the plan would work. On July 1, there were 36 newly confirmed cases of COVID-19 announced with only 109 individuals hospitalized with the virus in non-ICU beds. Albertans had answered the call to reach the vaccination threshold needed to remove nearly all restrictions (though the Restrictions Exemption Program was non-existent at the time). Things looked positive.

The Delta variant was just starting to become public knowledge but the low numbers of sick individuals in the province at the time made many feel that reopening was still relatively low risk. Of course, hindsight proved to us that this would turn into the deadliest wave of the pandemic to date. It did not take long for Delta to become the dominant strain and to bring our province’s health care system to the brink of collapse. This is not said lightly given we were monitoring for the triggering of the Critical Care Triage Protocol.

Politically, there was some pressure for the move to be made, but it was not to the extent that we saw last week. The United Conservative Party first announced in spring 2021 that they would hold a leadership review in fall 2022. On May 13th, we watched in real time as MLA Todd Loewen expressed his loss of confidence in the Premier. Ultimately, the Premier was able to quash any potential uprising, resulting in the ejection of Loewen and MLA Drew Barnes from the UCP Caucus.

Ultimately, the Best Summer Ever led to what was (at the time) the wave of highest transmission and impact on our health care system. The Restrictions Exemption Program was eventually introduced in September as a way to incentivize increased vaccine uptake and to reduce transmission in most public spaces.

Then came Omicron.

The End of the Restrictions Exemption Program

To once again qualify this section, there has been no formal announcement at the time of writing; therefore, we will operate under the assumption the REP will come to an end sometime this week or in the near future.

There are some very obvious differences in our public health situation now versus the Best Summer Ever. While ICU beds are still being stretched, there is a much lower demand which is a step in the right direction. However, it is known that individual facilities in urban settings are still experiencing serious strain on ICU resources (most prominently in Edmonton, Calgary, and Red Deer). It also should not be overlooked that we are still experiencing record-high levels of hospitalizations. Double digit deaths continue to be recorded daily, as well.

Unlike Best Summer Ever, vaccine rollout has been expanded to include children in the 5-11 year old range and it appears we are inching closer to approval of the Pfizer vaccine for children 6 months to 4 years old in the United States. All positive steps towards improving immunity levels in the general population.

However, unlike Best Summer Ever, there is deafening subtext that most are acutely aware of.

On April 9th at the Cambridge Red Deer Hotel and Conference Centre, the UCP will be hosting a special general meeting for the purpose of conducting Premier Jason Kenney’s leadership review. We are a mere 60 days away from the event, which means you can most certainly guarantee that Premier Kenney has begun to campaign party members, starting with his MLAs.

If you were paying attention to the social media channels of government MLAs this past week, you will likely have already deduced how much internal pressure the Premier is facing from his Caucus. The Coutts blockade has served as an incredibly strong internal wedge issue at the worst possible time for Kenney. Even his own cabinet has shown a public divide.

Ministers Doug Schweitzer and Rajan Sawhney have both publicly spoken out against the blockade. When asked whether the blockade was the sort of incident that the Critical Infrastructure Defence Act was developed for, Schweitzer said “110 per cent”. He would even go so far as to say he would be very interested in learning why his Caucus colleague, MLA Grant Hunter, thought it a wise idea to attend to show support for the protest

While these two did not directly speak out against COVID-19 restrictions, Government House Leader Jason Nixon was among those who did.

In a public letter, Nixon wrote that “my position on vaccine mandates is that they need to end. I’ve told this to the Premier, to caucus, and now to you. You’ll note that the Premier said they’ll be gone imminently, and I’ll hold him to it.” The Government House Leader didn’t hold back in his criticism of the Restrictions Exemption Program, saying that mandates are “not as effective against the current COVID-19 situation as much as health officials expected.”

Multiple other MLAs have indicated their support for removing the vaccine passport though their support of the protest happening down in Coutts. Those include MLAs Michaela Frey, the aforementioned Grant Hunter, and Shane Getson. The UCP Rural Caucus had to release a statement denying claims from the blockade participants suggesting they had struck a deal with the government to allow for some movement in exchange for the vaccine passport being rescinded.

As we alluded to earlier in this article, it would be unfair to say this move is entirely political as other jurisdictions have begun (or are planning) to implement similar public health policy decisions. Even well prior to the pandemic arriving in our province, the Alberta Government generally gives significant weight to interjurisdictional policy analyses as a way to determine what path forward we could travel on a given issue. However, the political lens cannot be ignored in this context.

Dr. Deena Hinshaw offered a word of caution during a recent press conference. "While our leading indicators of wastewater surveillance and positivity are signaling that we are on the other side of the fifth wave, and it is encouraging to see that hospitalizations may be at a plateau, at the same time it is critical to remember that half of all of our cases come in the second part of the wave, and transmission is still very high."