RANT: NEED FOR A HOME GROWN VACCINE PRODUCER

    "Whaaa...?"

THEY JUST ANNOUNCED a third (or was it a fourth?) lockdown here in Ontario. We’re set to go for another month of “Hold your breath, sir, when you address me in that tone!” (Or any tone, for that matter.) Vaccines are trundling out—slooowly—and there are complaints that Canada’s vax programme isn’t up to snuff. Even the United States, with the many flaws in its health care system is vaxing at a much greater rate compared with Canada, almost two-to-one actually. According to a recent data spread, the US has vaxed about 30% of its population with at least one dose, while Canada, with its much respected (and deservedly so) national health care system, has given a first dose to a little more than 16%.

Supplies and jabs are ramping up as of April with shipments of the AstraZeneca and Moderna vaccines, but first jab vaccinations might not be completed until September, though some sources are saying earlier.  

Israel has fully vaccinated almost 56% of its population, the United States, 19%, while Canada only 2%. The question is, could Canada have done better vaccination-wise? And the answer is: I don’t know. Other commentators have remarked on the fact that Canada has had to out-source all its vaccine requirements from other countries, with delays and bottlenecks at various times popping up in the ‘wild west’ scene of international pharmaceutical sales and shipments.

Not everyone will recall, but from about 1914 until 1986 Canada had a domestic producer of vaccines, Connaught Laboratories, which was initially a private company that became a Crown Corporation in 1972. It was a world leader in virology and vaccine research, producing numerous influenza vaccines for domestic and global markets. Earlier, it was instrumental in the production of insulin after WWII. In 1986, the government sold Connaught to a private company and Canada no longer had a domestic producer of vaccines nor the research facilities to develop them.

It will be interesting if future Federal governments decide it would be a good idea to have our own research and development facilities, so we can  better prepare for the next pandemic, though I won’t be holding my breath (even if I probably should.)

 

April CBC Report: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/track-how-many-people-have-been-given-the-covid-19-vaccine-across-canada-1.5870573

 

 

Cheers, Jake.

 

"You're NOT social distancing!" "No. YOU'RE not..."