Curfews & More Restrictions Are Not The Answer

It is precisely when freedom seems the most ‘inconvenient’ that we must defend it

By Spencer Fernando, Exclusive to the National Citizens Coalition

If I told you a year ago that Canadians would not only be accepting of government-mandated curfews, but downright supportive of them, I would have seemed like a crazy person.

And yet, that’s where we find ourselves today.

Surveys show the majority of Canadians in support of further lockdowns and curfews being imposed by politicians.

No matter how much damage lockdowns do, and regardless of the fact that cases are going up even as stricter and stricter lockdowns are imposed, many people continue to demand further and further restrictions.

From one perspective, this is understandable.

People are afraid, and fear leads to a desire for a dominant authority to ‘protect us,’ and for control to be asserted over that which scares us.

Unfortunately, many politicians have simply decided to continually play into this sentiment, without regard for the damage and ineffectiveness it brings.

For example, something that many people have been saying for quite some time is that proactive, rather than reactive measures should be taken.

Key among those measures is distributing Vitamin D widely to the population, something the government could easily organize, and which would cost a tiny fraction of what they have already spent.

Evidence continues to pile up showing that Vitamin D makes a massive difference in outcomes for those infected:

“Professor Angus Dalgleish, Professor of Oncology at St George's, University of London, tells @LBC from data this weekend he has seen Finland has one of the lowest infection rates. It's also the only country that provides Vitamin D.”

“Professor Dalgleish: "Why haven't they (the Government) addressed this one thing that if you do get infected then it is the most effective way of making you least likely to go to hospital and dying?

"If you've got a very good Vitamin D level then it can and will protect.”

“Does Vitamin D combat Covid 19? YES!

‘’The message should have been: ‘everyone take vitamin D and cut out the junk food. I think it’s a no brainer because there is no harm from vitamin D and it’s cheap’”

“Reducing Covid-19 deaths: it has been done in Andalucía, Spain, using Vitamin D. Reduction of deaths per day from 60 to 3 within six weeks. Vitamin D is essential for controlling this pandemic NOW.”

Why haven’t we heard this from the Canadian government?

Why haven’t there been public information campaigns on the importance of Vitamin D and losing weight for virus outcomes?

Other important measures would include addressing where the most vulnerable are being infected - long-term care homes.

Nearly a year into this crisis however, they are still being ravaged.

For all their lockdowns, all their restrictions, all their threats, and all their condescension towards regular people – who are always blamed when cases go up – those in power failed to use this time to protect those at the most risk.

Consider just one thing, the fact that care home workers are often paid terribly low wages. This leads to financial insecurity for those workers, who have to then work multiple jobs, including in the broader community, and sometimes at other care homes. They then unwittingly transmit the virus, bringing it from place to place and leading to infections among those least able to fight them off.

If the government had provided a huge increase to their wages – and perhaps even paid for their lodging in hotels – it would have been a big boost to the defence of care home residents.

Just those two things, an emphasis on Vitamin D distribution, and increasing the financial security of care home workers, could have made a huge difference, saving lives without locking down the rest of our society.

This in turn would have helped push back against the rising level of fear, as it would give each person something they could do in their own lives to strengthen their potential protection, rather than relying on a politician forcing ‘everyone else’ to be restricted.

But instead, this action wasn’t taken.

Rather, we ended up with policies that are the definition of insanity:

When cases go up, they add more lockdowns.

When cases go up despite those lockdowns, they add more lockdowns.

When cases go up despite those added lockdowns, they threaten curfews.

And so on and so on.

No outside-the-box thinking.

No innovation.

No holistic view of society that accounts for the damage these lockdowns and restrictions are doing.

And no acknowledgment that having the government tell you when you can and can’t go outside – with people now being arrested for walking their dog or leaving their property outside ‘allowed hours’ – is incompatible with a free society.

Of course, all of this can make it feel that the world is spinning even more out of control, becoming disturbing and unrecognizable.

And it can be a lonely feeling for many, on top of the physical loneliness countless isolated people are experiencing.

In these circumstances it can be easy to just go along with the crowd, and support ever-increasing restrictions.

After all, as many have disturbingly said online, “why would you be going out after 8:00 pm anyway?”

Courage

Yet, as difficult as it may be, this is precisely the time when we need to have the courage to defend freedom.

Standing up for what is right is often a lonely pursuit, and it’s often unpopular in the moment.

But we cannot allow our nation to become a place where our fear compels us into cheering on the elimination of our rights and the expansion of pervasive state power.

We cannot let the same hypocritical politicians who signed off on international travel while telling us to stay home continue to act as if they have the credibility and authority to boss us around.

And we cannot give in to the ‘safe feeling’ of letting those in power dictate which freedoms they will ‘grant’ us with based on their temporary whims. Because, when this crisis is over, they will find a new ‘reason’ to restrict our rights ‘for our own good.’

We must be better than this, and those of us who feel deep down that this is wrong need to continue speaking out in defence of freedom for Canadians.

Click to join the mailing list so you can receive his exclusive weekly column for NCC supporters right to your inbox.