Is Alberta about to abandon its vaccine passport system?

EDMONTON – While some Alberta government MPs are publicly calling for the termination of the province’s vaccine passport system amid ongoing truck protests, demand is mounting for Prime Minister Jason Kenney.

Does he do it now, or later?

Kenney said this week he could see the passport system – called the Alberta Restriction Program – abandoned by the end of February.

But a large blockade of protesters near the Coutts, Alta., Border crossing to Montana, and some of Kenney’s own MPs, calls for an immediate end to it.

Jason Nixon, Alberta’s Secretary of the Environment and longtime right-hand man for Kenney, issued a statement on Thursday calling for the province’s vaccine mandates to end.

“You will notice that the prime minister said they will be gone soon, and I will stick to that,” Nixon said. “I am not a doctor, so like many I have relied on the advice of doctors for the past two years.

“But it is now clear that mandates such as the Restriction Exemption Program are not as effective against the current COVID-19 situation as health officials expected.”

This seems to be a sign of what has been a turbulent time in the United Conservative caucus for months. UCP MPs are divided over public health restrictions and some want to see Kenney suspended as leader because of the way he handled the pandemic. A highly anticipated leadership review is scheduled for April.

Alberta’s chief medical officer of health, dr. Deena Hinshaw, meanwhile, said at a Thursday news conference that the restriction exemption program caused vaccine coverage to increase “significantly” when it was introduced last September and that it had a “significant beneficial impact”.

Hinshaw said policy decisions, such as how long to keep the program, rest with elected officials and did not give an opinion on whether it should proceed when asked by a reporter.

Such questions can be loaded.

The prime minister has been criticized for miscalculating the COVID-19 situation last summer when he declared it the ‘best summer ever’, lifted restrictions and refused to bring in a vaccine passport. The system allows organizers or business owners to use a QR code to verify customers’ vaccination status when attending venues, events or restaurants.

He eventually withdrew under pressure from rising case numbers and was chastised by people on both sides of the public health constraints debate. Some say he introduced too many measures (such as the passport system); others said he did not do enough.

The consequences of that turbulent time are still clear, if Kenney’s low ballot box numbers give any indication.

Nixon also slammed the federal government for the situation taking place at the Coutts border crossing, where hundreds of trucks showed up this week and impeded traffic. Dangerous incidents took place during the protest this week and RCMP tried to enforce the law but has so far failed to clear up the blockade, which was its sixth day on Thursday.

Protesters near Coutts are calling for the termination of vaccine mandates, along with the truck convoy that went to Ottawa last week and brought thousands of supporters along.

Some want to see an end to a mandate introduced this month that requires Canadian truck drivers to be fully vaccinated if they want to avoid a 14-day quarantine when entering the United States. The US has put in place a similar policy.

Nixon said he also wants to see that policy canceled.

“At the federal border, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is throwing gasoline on the flames while several industries are waiting for goods to cross the U.S. border,” he said.

RJ Sigurdson, the UCP MLA for Highwood who has been against public health restrictions in the past, tweeted on Thursday: “I believe the (Restriction Exemption Program) should be lifted as soon as possible.”

Earlier this week, the United Conservative caucus denied what he described as reports that MPs had “negotiated an agreement with Alberta’s ruling party to end the Coutts blockade” pending a meeting on lifting the restriction exemption program .

“No such agreement has been authorized and the meeting is not to discuss the removal of the (program),” said UCP caucus chairman MP Nathan Neudorf, adding that the province, however, plans to lift the program. charge, “probably within days.”

Kenney said this week that the county will look at “the overall trends altogether” when deciding when to recall the program. Hospitalizations and surgery delays are especially important measures to keep an eye on, Kenney added.

Relaxation of public health measures can come in three stages, Kenney said, and the Restriction Exemption Program will be one of the first measures to go.

At a Tuesday news conference, Kenney acknowledged the simmering tension.

“Please, to people who are so frustrated, with God, I share the frustration,” he said.