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Alberta

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith to consider halting COVID vaccines for healthy children

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5 minute read

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said she will consider the findings of a report she commissioned that called for halting COVID shots for healthy children and teenagers, admitting there are questions about the ā€œefficacyā€ of the jab in kids.

ā€œI was pleased to see that we had a broad cross-section of doctors able to look at our previous COVID response, identify processes that were in place, identify things that may have gone wrong,ā€Ā Smith said [24:50 min mark] while speaking to reporters on January 29.

Smith was responding to a question in response to the Alberta COVID-19 Pandemic Data Review Task Forceā€™s ā€œCOVID Pandemic Responseā€ 269-pageĀ final reportĀ released last week.

She said she is looking to ā€œidentify things that are now under question, like the efficacy of masks and the efficacy of this vaccine in children.ā€

Smith added that her government is ā€œgoing to take a look atā€ the reportā€™s findings and ā€œobviously weā€™ll, weā€™ll make some decisions about whether to move forward on any of the recommendations.ā€

The report wasĀ commissioned by SmtihĀ last year, giving the task force a sweeping mandate to investigate her predecessorā€™s COVID-era mandates and policies.

The task forceā€™s final report was released last week. It recommended halting ā€œthe use of COVID-19 vaccines without full disclosure of their potential risksā€ as well as outright ending their use ā€œfor healthy children and teenagers as other jurisdictions have done,ā€ mentioning countries like ā€œDenmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, and the U.K.ā€

Among the recommendations of the task force was the call to ā€œ(f)urther research to establish the safety and efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines is necessary before widespread use in adults and children,ā€ the establishment of ā€œa website and/or call-in center for the vaccine injured in Albertaā€ as well as establishing a ā€œmechanism for opting out of federal health policy until provincial due process has been satisfied.ā€

The report also noted that ā€œ(c)hildren and teenagers have a very low risk of serious illness from COVID-19. COVID-19 vaccines were not designed to halt transmission and there is a lack of reliable data showing that the vaccines protect children from severe COVID-19.ā€

Smith: Doctorsā€™ right to ā€˜speak their mindā€™ must be protected

While answering reportersā€™ questions on January 29, Smith also said the doctors in the province need to be able to ā€œspeak their minds without punishment from their colleges.ā€

ā€œI think thatā€™s going to be important too, otherwise, politicians only bad decisions,ā€ she noted.

The report touched on how many doctors in Alberta who gave opposing views to the mainstream narrative regarding COVID jabs, masks, and the use of alternatives to treat the virus were wrongly vilified.

Smith mentioned that the point of the report was to find out what went wrong during COVID and to not repeat the same mistakes should there be another pandemic.

LifeSiteNews has published anĀ extensive amount of researchĀ on the dangers of the experimental COVID mRNA jabs that include heart damage and blood clots.

The mRNA shots have alsoā€Æbeen linked toā€Æa multitude of negative and often severe side effects in children and all haveā€Æconnections to cell lines derived from aborted babies.

After becoming premier in late 2022, Smith promptlyĀ fired theĀ provinceā€™s top doctor, Deena Hinshaw, and the entire AHS board of directors, all of whom oversaw the implementation of COVID mandates.

 

Under predecessor Jason Kenney, thousands of nurses, doctors, and other healthcare and government workers lost their jobs for choosing to not get the jabs, leading Smith to sayĀ ā€“ onlyĀ minutes after being swornĀ inĀ ā€“Ā that over the past year the ā€œunvaccinatedā€ were the ā€œmost discriminated againstā€ group of people in her lifetime.

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Alberta

Alberta extracting more value from oil and gas resources: ATB

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From the Canadian Energy Centre

By Will Gibson

Investment in ā€˜value-addedā€™ projects more than doubled to $4 billion in 2024

In the 1930s, economist Harold Innis coined the term ā€œhewers of wood and drawers of waterā€ to describe Canadaā€™s reliance on harvesting natural resources and exporting them elsewhere to be refined into consumer products.

Almost a century later, ATB Financial chief economist Mark Parsons has highlighted a marked shift in that trend in Albertaā€™s energy industry, with more and more projects that upgrade raw hydrocarbons into finished products.

ATBĀ estimatesĀ that investment in projects that generate so-called ā€œvalue-addedā€ products like refined petroleum, hydrogen, petrochemicals and biofuels more than doubled to reach $4 billion in 2024.

ā€œAlberta is extracting more value from its natural resources,ā€ Parsons said.

ā€œIt makes the provincial economy somewhat more resilient to boom and bust energy price cycles. It creates more construction and operating jobs in Alberta. It also provides a local market for Albertaā€™s energy and agriculture feedstock.ā€

The shift has occurred as Albertaā€™s economy adjusts to lower levels of investment in oil and gas extraction.

While overall ā€œupstreamā€ capital spending has been rising since 2022 ā€” and oil production has never been higher ā€” investment last year of about $35 billion is still dramatically less than the $63 billion spent in 2014.

Parsons pointed to Dowā€™s $11 billionĀ Path2ZeroĀ project as the largest value-added project moving ahead in Alberta.

ā€‹ā€‹The project, which has support from the municipal, provincial and federal governments, will increase Dowā€™s production of polyethylene, the worldā€™s most widely used plastic.

By capturing and storing carbon dioxide emissions and generating hydrogen on-site, the complex will be the worldā€™s first ethylene cracker with net zero emissions from operations.

Other major value-added examples include Air Productsā€™ $1.6 billion net zeroĀ hydrogen complex, and the associated $720 millionĀ renewable diesel facilityĀ owned by Imperial Oil. Both projects are slated for startup this year.

Parsons sees the shift to higher value products as positive for the province and Canada moving forward.

ā€œDownstream energy industries tend to have relatively high levels of labour productivity and wages,ā€ he said.

ā€œA big part of Canadaā€™s productivity problem is lagging business investment. These downstream investments, which build off existing resource strengths, provide one pathway to improving the countryā€™s productivity performance.ā€

Heather Exner-Pirot, the Macdonald-Laurier Instituteā€™s director of energy, natural resources and environment, sees opportunities for Canada to attract additional investment in this area.

ā€œWe are able to benefit from the mistakes of other regions. In Germany, their business model for creating value-added products such as petrochemicals relies on cheap feedstock and power, and theyā€™ve lost that due to a combination of geopolitics and policy decisions,ā€ she said.

ā€œCanada and Alberta, in particular, have the opportunity to attract investment because they have stable and reliable feedstock with decades, if not centuries, of supply shielded from geopolitics.ā€

Exner-Pirot is also bullish about the increased market for low-carbon products.

ā€œWith our advantages, Canada should be doing more to attract companies and manufacturers that will produce more value-added products,ā€ she said.

Like oil and gas extraction, value-added investments can help companies develop new technologies that can themselves be exported, said Shannon Joseph, chair of Energy for a Secure Future, an Ottawa-based coalition of Canadian business and community leaders.

ā€œThis investment creates new jobs and spinoffs because these plants require services and inputs. Investments such as Dowā€™s Path2Zero have a lot of multipliers. Success begets success,ā€ Joseph said.

ā€œInvestment in innovation creates a foundation for long-term diversification of the economy.ā€

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Alberta

Alberta government must restrain spending in upcoming budget to avoid red ink

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From the Fraser Institute

By Tegan Hill and Milagros Palacios

Whether due toĀ U.S. tariffsĀ or lower-than-expectedĀ oil prices, the Smith government has repeatedly warned Albertans that despite a $4.6 billion projected budget surplus in 2024/25, Alberta could soon be in the red. To help avoid this fate, the Smith government must restrain spending in its upcoming 2025 budget.

These are not simply numbers on a page; budget deficits have real consequences for Albertans. For one, deficits fuel debt accumulation. And just as Albertans must pay interest on their own mortgages or car loans, taxpayers must pay interest on government debt. Each dollar spent paying interest is a dollar diverted from programs such as health care and education, or potential tax relief. This fiscal year, provincial government debt interest costs will reach a projected $650 per Albertan.

And while many risk factors are out of the governmentā€™s direct control, the government can control its own spending.

In its 2023Ā budget, the Smith government committed to keep the rate of spending growth to below the rate of inflation and population growth. This was an important step forward after decades of successive governments substantially increasing spending during good timesā€”when resource revenues (including oil and gas royalties) were relatively high (as they are today)ā€”but failing to rein in spending when resource revenue inevitably declined.

But hereā€™s the problem. Even if the Smith government sticks to this commitment, it may still fall into deficit. Why? Because this government has spent significantly more than it originally planned in its 2022 mid-year plan (the Smith governmentā€™s first fiscal update). In other words, the governmentā€™s ā€œrestraintā€ is starting from a significantly higher base level of spending. For example, this fiscal year it will spend $8.2 billion more than it originally planned in its 2022 mid-year plan. And inflation and population growth only account for $3.1 billion of this additional spending. In other words, $5.1 billion of this new spending is unrelated to offsetting higher prices or Albertaā€™s growing population.

Because of this higher spending and reliance on volatile resource revenue, red ink looms.

Indeed, while the Smith government projects budget surpluses over the next three fiscal years, fuelled by historically high resource revenue, if resource revenue was at its average of the last two decades, this yearā€™s $4.6 billion projected budget surplus would turn into a $5.8 billion deficit. And projected budget surpluses in 2025/26 and 2026/27 would flip to budget deficits. To be clear, this is not a far-fetched scenarioā€”resource revenue plummeted by nearly 70 per cent in 2015/16.

In contrast, if resource revenue fell to its average (again, based on the last two decades) but the Smith government held to its original 2022 spending plan, Alberta would still have a balanced budget in 2026/27.

Bottom line; had the Smith government not substantially increased spending over the last two years, Albertaā€™s spending levels today would align with more stable ongoing levels of revenue, which would put Alberta on more stable fiscal footing in the years to come.

Premier Smith has warned Albertans a budget deficit may be on the way. To mitigate the risk of red ink moving forward, the Smith government should show real spending restraint in its 2025 budget.

Tegan Hill

Director, Alberta Policy, Fraser Institute

Milagros Palacios

Director, Addington Centre for Measurement, Fraser Institute
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