Update - 8th January
While politicians threatened to fine us if we had family over for Christmas, they jetted off to tropical destinations.
While we were stuck at home or risking arrest for going skating, they were relaxing on the beach.
While our small businesses were forced to close, or had to deal with such severe restrictions they might as well be closed, politicians spent their money at small businesses in other countries.
Whether it's Ministers, MPs, MLAs, Councillors, political staff, or government officials, the problem really isn't the travel, it's the hypocrisy.
How dare they tell us to sit at home, cancel travel plans, and not even go across the City to see loved ones, while they carry on as normal?
Most interestingly, if those holding daily meetings with health officials, with access to all the data they could want, feel comfortable travelling to other countries where COVID rates are higher, why can't we visit family members or shop at a local store?
Let's be clear: no-one is calling for a complete free for all - realistically we probably won't be back to normal normal until later this year.
But with some basic, sensible precautions, we could return to something much closer to normal than where we are right now.
If you agree, please sign our petition to End The Lockdowns and End The Hypocrisy.
Update - 8th December
Jason Kenney just cancelled Christmas in Alberta.
Yep, no social gatherings allowed, indoor or outdoor, and all restaurants, bars, cafes, fitness centers, recreation centres, gyms, and many more must close for at least the next four weeks.
In July, Jason Kenney said:
"We can't enforce our way out of the pandemic."
Now, he's trying to enforce his way out of the pandemic.
Yes, there are more cases now than in July, and yes that means Albertans should take more personal responsibility and care.
But that doesn't change the truth of his July statement that government mandates are not the solution to this problem.
If you agree with July Premier Kenney rather than December Premier Kenney, please sign our petition to End The Lockdowns.
Update - 26th November
Adam Skelly, owner of Adamson Barbecue was arrested today for continuing to open his Adamson Barbecue restaurant.
The restaurant's locks were also changed overnight in an unsuccessful attempt to prevent him from opening.
This has all gone far too far.
People are just trying to protect their livelihoods and their businesses.
Restaurants are still allowed to open safely in Alberta, why not elsewhere?
Update - 23rd November
This afternoon, in Alberta a "Cabinet Committee", made up of only a handful of senior ministers will meet to decide whether Albertans will face further COVID-19 related restrictions on their lives, livelihoods, and rights, as has already happened in other provinces.
From the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, one of our primary concerns has been the risk of moving targets - that the goalposts for "success" set by governments would be constantly shifted to the point where success is impossible and failure (and therefore greater restrictions) are inevitable.
The original goal was to "flatten the curve", remember - though as you'll see below, we had concerns about even that original plan.
But for now, let's focus on the original "flatten the curve" plan, and compare the plan to what actually happened - particularly in Alberta.
On April 8, 2020, the Alberta Government released its first models, predicting a "probable" peak of 818 COVID-19 hospitalizations occurring in late May.
By April 28, 2020, it was apparent that the early models were embarrassingly wrong, so they tried again.
On April 28, 2020, the province released updated models, this time giving themselves some room for error with an elevated, probable, and low prediction.
As it turned out, even the revised best-case scenario prediction was very wrong - by about four times.
Today, you will find a disclaimer on the Alberta Government's COVID-19 stats site saying that the models are "not intended to be a predictor of day-to-day increases in hospitalization rates" and that "no updated models are being planned at this time."
Ok, but, then, what are they intended to be?
And, if we're not relying on models anymore, what are we relying on for current decision making?
This is an important question, as cases are increasing again, and the provincial government has started mandating further restrictions.
Instead of "flattening the curve"; we have - at staggering socioeconomic expense - squished it so hard that we succeeded only in delaying the inevitable into winter.
We are not experiencing a second wave, only a first wave deferred by 8 months, to a time when being sick is far more dangerous.
Lockdowns are not a viable strategy and will only destroy any remaining hopes of survival for local businesses.
It's time to demand better.
It's time to End The Lockdown.
Update - 13th May
The province's first set of projections on the number of infections, number of hospitalizations, and the number of patients requiring intensive care were so dramatically overstated that they had to release an entirely new set of projections three weeks later.
But even that second lowered set of projects have proven to be far too high.
Alberta has over 8,000 acute care beds, and had set aside about 2,000 of them specifically for COVID-19 patients.
The province's absolute best-case scenario projected there would be 300 people in hospital with COVID right now.
In reality, there are only 59.
-----
Tomorrow, the rest of the province will begin to slowly re-open Alberta's now devastated economy, but Calgary is being left out.
After being told they would likely be allowed to open tomorrow, bars, restaurants, hairdressers and such have been preparing their businesses to welcome customers in a safe manner.
Instead, this afternoon, at the last minute, after many (often very expensive) preparations have been made, they've had the rug pulled out from under them again.
For bars and restaurants, which must stock perishable goods, this is even worse than if they'd just been told they couldn't open in the first place.
In the words of one industry insider:
Do they any idea what they just did to hundreds of small businesses in Calgary who believed them when they were told that an opening was coming tomorrow?
I owned a pub for five years. You don’t simply turn on a light switch and open the doors after having been closed for months.
What few business owners remained, just took what few dollars they may have left in order to deep clean their places, put up new barriers, pay staff for meetings in order to bring in new policies, buy and prep thousands in perishable stock and likely advertise their partial reopenings.
Why believe this government and prep for any re-opening now? An owner will have no idea until the last damn second if the re-opening is actually allowed or not. They can’t prep for that! They have already learned the price they will pay for believing the government on this.
Many are saying to hell with it today and they didn’t need to.
-----
End The Lockdown
When the world entered Lockdown six weeks ago we didn't know much about the size of the threat posed by COVID-19.
Without that information, a short Lockdown may well have been justified while we got a handle on the situation.
In fact, that is precisely how the initial Lockdown was justified by health officials and politicians - as a way to buy time to prepare the government and the healthcare system to handle the sick.
It's vital to remember that the plan was to "flatten the curve".
Health officials knew then - and still know now - that flattening the curve does not reduce the total number of people who will get infected.
It *is* true that if our healthcare systems were going to be over capacity, then flattening the curve would reduce the total number of deaths by ensuring that everyone who needs treatment would be able to access it.
But, if healthcare systems are not exceeding capacity (and they aren't), then flattening the curve doesn't save lives either.
Some people have struggled with this concept as they see the low number of infections being reported each day and think that means we are "beating" the virus.
But we are not beating the virus.
Remember fewer infections now doesn't mean fewer infections in total, it means we are simply delaying infections out to future weeks and months.
In fact, a Lockdown would not reduce the total number of infections or the total number of deaths unless we totally quarantined the entire world for 18 months or more until we have a vaccine or a cure.
No credible expert is proposing that kind of extended Lockdown, because even they realize the incredible damage the Lockdown is doing to the world's economy.
Record high unemployment, businesses shut down permanently, livelihoods, savings, retirement funds gone, and - in recent days - signs that the food chain may even be starting to breakdown.
Many people have said that the economic impacts of the cure may well be worse than the disease.
But, even putting aside the economy, the long-run health effects of the Lockdown will almost certainly be worse than the health effects of the disease.
The Lockdown has discouraged many from accessing hospitals and primary healthcare, putting people at risk from conditions that could be easily treated if detected early, but are deadly if not.
This "leave it until after the pandemic" mentality will cost many lives that might otherwise have been saved.
In poorer countries, the stakes are even higher - an economic crash means greater poverty and less money for the basic necessities of life like food and clean drinking water.
As the former UN General Secretary Kofi Annan said, "the biggest enemy of health is poverty."
All around the world, governments are "updating" their models, retroactively trying to hide the fact that the spread of the disease has been far less dramatic, and far less damaging, than even their "best case" scenarios predicted.
At the same time, governments are now shifting the goalposts, trying to justify the policies they adopted by changing how they measure success, and changing the conditions under which a Lockdown will end.
No longer are they claiming that the Lockdown was designed to ensure the healthcare system didn't go over capacity, they're now claiming the Lockdown is a key part of tackling the spread of the disease in the longterm.
That is counter to everything they said to justify entering the Lockdown.
Do they really think we can't remember what they said just 6 weeks ago?
If anything, hospitals being under-capacity is actually a sign that the Lockdown is working *too well*, as it means we are pushing too many infections to the future, meaning our economy will be crippled for far longer than would otherwise be required.
The simple fact is that had we known 6 weeks ago what we know now, we would have never entered a Lockdown in the first place.
We would have dealt with this virus the same way we have dealt with viruses in the past - improved personal hygiene, enhanced cleaning, protection of the vulnerable, voluntary social distancing, limited travel, and general conscientiousness.
While their approach has been controversial in the media, that's the approach the experts in Sweden took and though they had more cases in the initial days of the outbreak, they didn't destroy their economy and are now on track to have roughly the same number of total infections as countries that implemented a full Lockdown.
Yes, of course, hindsight is 2020, which is why a short Lockdown was probably initially justified.
But now that we have more information, now that we have that hindsight, it's time to change course.
Let us be clear, we are not proposing a full and immediate return to "normal", especially for those who are vulnerable.
It will take time to get back to completely normal.
But, with the simple precautions mentioned above, we can now return to something relatively close to normal, without the crippling economic damage we have seen in the last 6 weeks.
It is now time to End The Lockdown.
If you agree, please sign this petition to End The Lockdown, and then share it with your friends.
