Afghan crisis, health promises and an election called

“Let’s leave no one behind.” – Justin Trudeau utters this pledge at the end of a Liberal campaign ad that is still running on TV. How ironic. After all, according to Foreign Affairs Minister Marc Garneau, about 1,250 Canadian citizens, permanent residents and their family members, plus thousands of Afghan translators and other allies, have indeed been left behind. Andrew Rusk, co-founder of Not Left Behind, an advocacy group pushing Ottawa to bring Afghan interpreters to Canada stated, “We had four-and-a-half months to do the right thing, and we only had a plane on the ground in early August. If this was our best, it just wasn’t good enough.” Will this crisis preempt the federal election campaign? The Doha Agreement was signed on February 29, 2020, between the U.S. and Abdul Baradar of the Taliban; it called for American withdrawal by May 1, 2021. The Biden administration on July 8 shifted the date to August 31. For many months, war veterans and journalists warned him to start the evacuation of Afghan translators, security guards, and their families. Erin O’Toole wrote Trudeau on July 22, 2021. He said, “As Afghan interpreters plead for assistance from your government to flee from these threats of danger, your government remains silent. We must do the right thing and support them at a time when they need us most.” After Canada first gave asylum-seekers only three days to fill out a complicated form online in English, the website crashed. Unlike France, Ottawa did not offer to pick up people and take them to the airport. It simply advised these desperate people to go to the airport on their own, and wear something “red.” Many stood in sewage-filled canals holding up their papers, but were ignored by Canadian soldiers. On Tuesday, August 24, Trudeau promised that Canada would remain past the August 31 deadline. Yet less than 24 hours later, all our remaining soldiers and diplomats were removed and the last Canadian rescue flight took off. Canada had initially identified 8,000 Afghans needing evacuation. However, only 2,700 were evacuated. In contrast, since late July, the U.S. has evacuated 122,300 people, including 5,500 U.S. citizens and their families. Sadly, Trudeau gave false hope to thousands of vulnerable Afghans and even to Canadian citizens living there—abandoning them all to the brutality of Islamic extremists. As Rona Ambrose said on CTV, “We did not stop everything and focus.” Jagmeet Singh, called Canada’s sudden exit a “failure” and Erin O’Toole, claimed that “he (Trudeau) put his political interests ahead of a crisis there.” Marc Garneau accepted the criticism and indicated that he hoped to encourage, using economic leverage, the Taliban to reopen the airport and provide safe passage to Canadians and Afghan refugees. Many serious issues have made it unwise to dissolve parliament and call an election. In the past two weeks, the daily COVID-19 case counts have risen by 77%, hospitalizations by 75%, and those in ICU by 61%. Case numbers are doubling every 11 days in Alberta and every nine in British Columbia. As Edmonton Dr. Shazma Mithani warned, “Opening schools in September is certainly going to fuel the fire in a significant way. And I’m worried about what that means for our children who cannot be vaccinated right now. And I’m worried about what that means for the hospitals.” Quebec has been reporting about 600 new cases per day— the highest since late May. Ontario could see 7,000 new cases per day by mid-October, according to Dr. Allison McGeer at Sinai Health System in Toronto. Over 95% of cases in B.C. and Ontario are of the delta variant, which is not only far more transmissible but likely more lethal, especially for the unvaccinated. So far, Quebec and the Atlantic provinces have been relatively spared from this variant. Note that in Nova Scotia, the Progressive Conservatives under Tim Houston were behind the Liberals a few months ago by 28 points. Yet they scored a surprise victory mainly due to promised to improve health care accessibility. All major federal parties have various promises in terms of healthcare, but many will be overlooked due to emotions rising from the Afghan crisis. The three major parties pledge 10 paid sick days for workers in federally regulated jobs. The Liberals propose $6 billion to eliminate waitlists, plus $3 billion to “hire” new nurses and family physicians. They plan to train 50,000 new PSWs and raise their wage to $25/hour. The Conservatives would increase the Canada Health Transfer from 3% to 6%, and increase funding for palliative care, mental health and drug treatment, and give an accessibility tax credit for seniors who wish to remain at home. The NDP hopes to bring in a $10 billion pharmacare program, expand medicare to include dental, eye care, hearing care, and fertility procedures, and would take over private LTC facilities and make them public. Don’t forget that the federal deficit was already $354 billion for 2020-21 and has been projected at $155 billion for 2021-22. No party has clearly indicated how they (or our children and grandchildren) will pay for all of these promises! Living costs have increased. In the past six years, in Canada, gasoline has increased by 39%, electricity by 40%, natural gas by 45%, food by 23%, and the average house cost has increased from $425,000 to $600,000. Toronto housing prices have surged by 20% in only one year. Childcare is unaffordable in most cities. Last week, the Bloomberg Nanos Canadian Confidence Index declined by its greatest amount since April 2020. Also, last week the share of Canadians who saw the economy strengthening over the next six months fell from 54% in July to 37%. Much of Canada from British Columbia to Northern Ontario is on fire; there are thousands of displaced and homeless people. Drought and grasshoppers have exacted a major toll on prairie farmers. Relevant is a recent Navigator online survey, which found Canadians’ top concerns were the pandemic, the economy, and climate change. However, in the end, the Afghan crisis may well overshadow these issues and promises for many weeks. Don’t forget that it was Trudeau who, on the same day that Kabul fell to the Taliban, went ahead and called an unnecessary, $600-million vanity election. Much as images of the body on the beach of Alan Kurdi became pivotal five years ago, throughout the rest of the campaign, Trudeau will be asked daily about his government’s delay and mismanagement of the Afghan refugee crisis. Trudeau should recall the words of American CEO Irene Rosenfeld: “People vote with their hearts, not their heads.” Read: CPhA outlines five priorities for the federal election Ottawa physician Dr. Charles S. Shaver was born in Montreal. He is past-chair of the Section on General Internal Medicine of the Ontario Medical Association The views here are his own.

Afghan crisis, health promises and an election called

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