OTTAWA – The Canadian government is pleased to announce that Health Canada has approved AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, yet another vaccine that most Canadians won’t have access to for six months, if they’re lucky.
“I think all Canadians can take pride in the fact that Canada is a world leader in buying vaccines that will arrive and be distributed at some point,” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said while announcing the good news. “Canadians now have three approved vaccines to get excited about receiving sometime in the not-too-distant future. Like this June. Or September. Worst case scenario, next September.”
While some public health experts believe that Canada can not expect to achieve vaccination-based herd immunity for at least a year and should therefore be making more of an effort to suppress the spread of COVID and its increasingly dangerous variants in the meantime, the government is instead focusing on assuring worried Canadians that even more vaccines they won’t have access to will be approved soon.
“Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine will probably be approved in March and Novavax’s in April, which means that by summer Canadians will have five vaccines to not receive until many months from now,” Trudeau said.
Addressing concerns that Canada is approving these vaccines too quickly, Health Canada officials have pointed out that by the time Canadians actually get these shots, there will already have been months of data from Americans getting them. Maybe even years.
“It’s a very exciting time,” Trudeau said. “We hope Canadians will think of these vaccine approvals like trailers for a movie you’re very excited to see, but can’t see until summer. And you can’t really leave the house or spend time with family or friends until you see this movie. And you definitely can’t go to other movies, do not go to movies right now.”
“Really adds to the anticipation!”
“And, bright side, the Canadian public has been patiently waiting for the Liberals to bring in the pharmacare we’ve been promising for a quarter of a century, so, thanks to us, you guys should be really good at waiting by now.”
