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COVID-19

How to interact with people in an uncertain world

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7 minute read

I want to propose three general ground rules for interacting with people right now.

The rules are: (1) When you make plans, make them very specific, and avoid changing them at the last minute. (2) Defer to the most cautious person in your presence. (3) Do not take it personally if someone is more cautious than you.
To elaborate, with examples I made up:
(1) Be very detailed about any plans you make to see other people. If you invite friends over to sit in your driveway and have a drink, don’t suggest as people arrive that you sit on the back deck instead. Among your friends might be someone intending to give herself 10 feet of space instead of 6. She might have been excited about the driveway idea because it’s not only outdoors but effectively unbounded; she knew she’d be able to make as much space for herself as she felt she needed. Then you move to the deck and space is more limited, and she is faced with a really awkward decision.
If you and your co-worker decide to order from Domino’s, don’t switch it up and order from a local place instead. Your co-worker might be reassured by Domino’s no-human-contact-out-of-the-oven policy. That might be the most important thing to him.
So maybe you’re rolling your eyes right now and thinking, “But all the latest research shows that transmission on food surfaces is not something to be concerned about. Domino’s policy is overkill.” Or, “Transmission outdoors is super unlikely. The deck is fine!”
Not the point!
The point is that trying to make decisions on the fly is incredibly stressful. You might be 100% confident that you understand the relative risk of things. But you don’t know what other people’s understanding is. And the split-second after being told that the location or the menu has changed is not a good scenario for evaluating risk, especially with an audience. Don’t put people in that position.
(2) On that note, when you and a person in your presence have different (verbalized or apparent) levels of caution, the obvious and decent thing to do is match the more cautious person’s behaviors. If you don’t wear a mask but you notice one of your co-workers tends to, then put on a mask when you are going to be anywhere near them. Their mask usage is a clear indicator that they think mask usage is important. So match that caution in their presence as a courtesy, whether or not you acknowledge the public health value of wearing one.
If you and a friend want to take a walk, and you weren’t thinking 6 feet of space was essential, but they suggest a route and mention that they like it because there is plenty of space to give each other 6 feet, then be conscientious and pay attention, and give them space. If you get to a narrow area, recognize that you’ll have to go single-file until it widens again.
Look for body language. Get in the habit of noticing whether people are inching away or leaning back. This tells you that they are not comfortable. They are more cautious than your instincts. That doesn’t mean your instincts are wrong. But in the presence of this person, you need to defer to theirs.
(3) This also doesn’t mean that this person has an issue with you in particular. Do not take it personally.
Some people are approaching the world with an understanding that there are essentially two groups of people: the ones I live with, and everyone else. From a public health perspective, the standards I apply to interacting with anyone in the latter group should be consistent, whether you are someone I work with, a friend, a relative, or a stranger. I do not and cannot know whether you are carrying a potentially deadly, poorly understood, highly contagious virus, so to the greatest extent possible, I’m going to behave like you are carrying it, no matter who you are. It is more nuanced than that, of course, but not much. The point is, even if you’re not careless, the relative you just met for lunch yesterday might have been careless over the weekend. I do not, and cannot know.
So if someone says no thanks to your back deck or favorite pizza, or they wear a mask in a situation you find unnecessary, or they give you a wide berth around the corner of the trail, it’s really, truly, not about you. People want to interact with the world, and some of us never stop thinking about how to do it right in this not-at-all right world we find ourselves in.
I hope these are ideas people can agree to. I hope that, even if you are tired of modifying your behavior, or skeptical about the seriousness of this virus, you will consider these thoughts with a spirit of kindness. I hope, if you have kids, you will talk to them about how their behavior can not only affect other people’s physical health, but also their emotional well-being while trying to navigate many decisions.
Thanks for reading. Be good to each other. Stay safe. Deep breaths.

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COVID-19

Trudeau gov’t has paid out over $500k to employees denied COVID vaccine mandate exemptions

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From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

The Department of Health paid $177,991, the Department of Foreign affairs paid $88,223, the Correctional Service of Canada paid $65,694, and Statistics Canada paid $33,240

Federal managers have paid out over $500,000 in settlements to employees that were suspended under the Trudeau government’s COVID vaccine mandate. 

According to information obtained April 24 by Blacklock’s Reporter, records have revealed that Canadian federal managers have paid a total of $509,746 in damages and compensation to employees who were denied vaccine mandate exemptions. 

“What are the total expenditures on compensation, severance packages and settlements to employees who were impacted by the government’s requirement during the COVID-19 pandemic that federal public servants provide proof of vaccination?” Conservative MP Ted Falk had questioned. 

According to the official numbers released by Blacklock’s, the Department of Health paid $177,991, the Department of Foreign affairs paid $88,223, the Correctional Service of Canada paid $65,694, and Statistics Canada paid $33,240. 

The Department of National Defence further revealed that it compensated three employees with “damages under the Canadian Human Rights Act on grounds of discrimination based on religion.”  

Beginning November 2021, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government mandated that a total of 275,983 employees from the RCMP, military and main federal departments provide proof of vaccination as a condition of employment.    

Those who failed to do so risked dismissal or suspension without pay. While there were provisions for medical and religious exemptions, these were rarely granted. According to internal information, at the time of the mandates 95 percent of employees had already received the COVID vaccine.  

When the federal mandate was lifted in June 2022, 2,560 employees had been suspended without pay for refusing to show proof of vaccination.    

Indeed, implementing the vaccine mandate for federal employees has proved costly for Canadian taxpayers as Trudeau budgeted $198 million to enforce the COVID jabs on federal employees.  

“Treasury Board officials told us it was for rapid testing purchases and distribution,” Conservative MP Kelly McCauley (Edmonton West) told the House of Commons in 2021.  

“The Treasury Board website shows there are about 3,400 unvaccinated employees,” he added. “That works out to about $24,000 per employee for rapid testing.” 

Additionally, the Trudeau government will likely have to pay out even more former employees due to ongoing lawsuits over the mandates.  

In October, LifeSiteNews reported on how over 700 vaccine-free Canadians negatively affected by federal COVID jab dictates have banded together to file a multimillion-dollar class-action lawsuit against the Trudeau government.  

Similarly, Canadian taxpayers have already paid over $6 million via Canada’s Vaccine Injury Program (VISP) to those injured by COVID injections, with some 2,000 claims remaining to be settled. 

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COVID-19

Pfizer reportedly withheld presence of cancer-linked DNA in COVID jabs from FDA, Health Canada

Published on

From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

According to information released by the Epoch Times, Pfizer purposefully failed to advise drug regulators, including Health Canada, the U.S. FDA and the European Medicines Agency, that the cancer-linked SV40 DNA enhancer was present in their experimental COVID shot.

Pharmaceutical giant Pfizer reportedly “chose not to” inform Health Canada, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and other regulatory agencies that the cancer-linked Polyomavirus Simian Virus 40 (SV40) DNA sequence was in their widely distributed COVID-19 vaccine.  

According to information released April 23 by the Epoch Times, Pfizer purposefully failed to advise drug regulators, including Health Canada, the U.S. Food and Drugs Administration, and the European Medicines Agency, that SV40 was present in their experimental COVID shot.   

“I understand that there have been internal discussions at CBER [Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research] regarding the presents [sic] of an SV40 enhancer/promoter sequence, noting that its presence is unrelated to the purpose of the Pfizer’s plasmid as a transcription template for their mRNA COVID-19 vaccine,” Dr. Dean Smith, a senior scientific evaluator in Health Canada’s Vaccine Quality Division, wrote in an email to a colleague at the FDA about SV40. 

The August email was obtained by an access to information request by the Epoch Times.  

“Pfizer has communicated to us recently, that they apparently chose not to mention this information to EMA, FDA or HC at the time of their initial or subsequent submissions,” he added. 

Smith noted that Kevin McKernan, a microbiologist and former researcher and team leader for the MIT Human Genome project, and Dr. Phillip J. Buckhaults, who is a professor of cancer genomics as well as the director of the Cancer Genetics Lab at the University of South Carolina, had raised in a public manner earlier this year how SV40 was present in the jabs. 

While Health Canada originally told Canadians it was unaware of the SV40 enhancer’s presence, the agency has since confirmed the presence of the monkey-linked DNA sequence known to cause cancer when it was used in old polio vaccines. 

SV40 is used to enhance gene transcription when the shots are made. It has been linked to the spread of turbo cancers in those who have been exposed to the virus via contaminated injections.   

According to a 2002 study published in the Lancet, there is evidence that links the older polio vaccines, which were filed with SV40 contaminants, to certain forms of cancer.  

The authors of the 2002 study claim that the SV40-contaminated polio vaccine may have caused up to half of the 55,000 cases of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma diagnosed each year.  

SV40, according to the late vaccine developer Dr. Maurice Hilleman, was put in the polio vaccine and then put into wide circulation by Big Pharma company Merck inadvertently. 

Unfortunately, this is not the first evidence that Pfizer hid the presence of SV40 from drug regulators.  

According to Dr. Janci Lindsay, who works as the director of toxicology and molecular biology for Toxicology Support Services, Pfizer did not disclose the presence of SV40 “promoters” to both Health Canada and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, as well as the European Medicines Agency.  

She said, as reported in The Epoch Times, that the drug company “hid them.” 

“So it’s not just the fact that they’re there, it’s the fact that they were purposefully hidden from the regulators,” she noted. 

The news of Pfizer’s purposeful withholding of information comes as adverse effects from the first round of COVID shots have resulted in a growing number of Canadians who have filed for financial compensation over alleged injuries from the jabs, via Canada’s Vaccine Injury Program (VISP). 

Thus far, some VISP has already paid over $6 million to those injured by COVID injections, with some 2,000 claims remaining to be settled. 

Additionally, a recent study done by researchers with Canada-based Correlation Research in the Public Interest showed that 17 countries have found a “definite causal link” between peaks in all-cause mortality and the fast rollouts of the COVID shots as well as boosters. 

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