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August 18, 2021 (LifeSiteNews) – Ontario’s top doctor said Tuesday that anyone working public service jobs in the province should get COVID-19 jabs or face “regular” antigen testing along with Orwellian-sounding vaccine “educational sessions.”
“Covered organizations will be required to offer an educational session about the benefits and risks of covid-19 vaccination. In cases where individuals do not provide full proof of vaccination, they will be required to undergo regular testing and demonstrate continued negative results,” said Dr. Kieran Moore, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health, at a press conference.
Moore said there will be no costs for the COVID-19 antigen tests and that at a “minimum” they would be mandated once per week.
“It would escalate to up to twice or three times a week, depending on how Delta is spreading in the community. My preference is that any individual embrace immunization as the strategy to best protect themselves, their community, and those that can’t be immunized, especially children under 12 years of age,” said Moore.
Moore began his press conference saying that COVID-19 vaccines policies with jab mandates will be required in education and healthcare settings by early September, despite Premier Doug Ford saying only a few weeks ago he was against mandating vaccines.
Moore added that all workers in hospitals, including all of its staff, volunteers, and contractors, should get COVID-19 jabs or be prepared to face regular testing.
He said all post-secondary schools, group homes and shelters, retirement homes, paramedics, and licensed day homes must enact COVID-19 jab policies that support pressuring people to be injected.
Similarly, Moore said all public schools must come up with COVID-19 vaccine disclosure policies as well.
“I said time was of the essence, but now that time is here, we must take assertive action to protect the health and safety of all Ontarians, especially as we move closer to a return to school and the cooler weather drives us indoors,” said Moore.
“The policies I am announcing today are an important link in the chain of protection that will help keep Ontario strong in the face of the fourth wave.”
Moore stated that his new policies are only the “minimum” needed and that institutions will have full “authority” to implement “policies that go above and beyond” what he announced.
He told reporters that due to an “unexpected sudden drop” in COVID-19 injection rates and a “rise” in the Delta variant of the virus, future easing of COVID-19 rules will be stopped until further notice.
Moore also announced that the province will pause any further reopenings until further notice.
Just a few weeks ago, Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce told reporters that they will not be mandating that students and staff have COVID vaccinations before being allowed to return to class and that schoolchildren will not be segregated based on their vaccine status.
“With the respect to vaccines, our government’s been clear, our premier’s been clear that we will not mandate vaccine requirement for schools and for staff at this point, that’s not a decision point we are going to proceed with,” said Lecce.
Likewise, Ford said in July that “no one” in Ontario, including health care workers, will be forced to get a COVID-19 shot, saying it is their “choice.”
“No, I think it’s their constitutional right to take it or not take it; these are super bright people that work their backs off,” said Ford.
At the time, Ford also said he is against vaccine passports, noting he does not want to create a “split society.”
“The answer is no. We aren’t going to do it; we aren’t going to have a split society,” said Ford.
Lawyer blasts Ford’s apparent flip-flop
Interim president and lawyer for the Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF) Lisa Bildy blasted the Ford government’s flip-flop on mandating COVID-19 jabs for healthcare workers, saying it is a “dangerous” path.
“It was only a month ago that Doug Ford said that he would not impose mandatory vaccines on healthcare workers. His exact words were, ‘No, hard no.’ Yet here we are. He now appears to be caving to public pressure, even though he knows it’s the wrong thing to do,” Bildy told LifeSiteNews.
“It is starting us down a very dangerous path when citizens are pressured to divulge their personal medical information, and worse, to submit to taking a vaccine that they may not require, perhaps having natural immunity already, or that they do not wish to take after weighing the risks and benefits.”
Bildy mentioned that even the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has noted the COVID-19 jabs have been observed to not prevent people from getting COVID-19 or from spreading the virus.
“It makes no logical sense to impose vaccine mandates or passports, other than to assuage public fears and pressure,” Bildy told LifeSiteNews.
“This is particularly so for young people whose risk of severe outcomes from Covid are minuscule. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the right to security of the person, subject only to reasonable limits. It is meant to protect citizens from the unjustifiable and arbitrary intrusion of the state into their personal medical choices, and certainly from any sort of medical coercion.
“So far, it appears that the government is at least giving people the option of weekly testing and a ‘re-education’ session if they do not get the vaccine. Employees may also have exemptions under the Human Rights Code that are applicable.”
The Canadian federal government under Liberal Party Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced last Friday that, starting in October, Canada will mandate COVID-19 jabs as a requirement to travel domestically by air, train, or boat.
The government will also require employees in the federally regulated “air, rail and marine transportation sectors to be vaccinated” and all civil servants.
Last Wednesday, Canada Immigration Minister Marco Mendicino said that a vaccine passport will be “a key step forward in ensuring Canadians will have the documents they need once it is safe to travel again.”
The news of mandatory COVID-19 jabs for travel and federal workers came only days before Trudeau called a federal election that will take place on September 20.
Health Canada has authorized four COVID-19 injections for adults, all with connections to cells derived from aborted babies. All four have also been associated with severe side effects such as blood clots, rashes, miscarriages, and even heart attacks in young, healthy men.
Contacts:
Premier Doug Ford
Room 281
Legislative Building, Queen’s Park
Toronto, ON M7A 1A1
Phone: 416-325-1941
Email: [email protected]
Ontario Member of Provincial Parliament via the Ontario MPP Contact information page