Two broad themes this week, both from recent headlines. The first is the insanity of the plans for the Olympic Games, and especially the unethical 颅prioritization for COVID-19 immunization of elite Olympic athletes over vulnerable 颅people and essential workers in 颅low-income countries. The second is a couple of astonishing ideas from the fossil-fuel 颅industry and its political 颅supporters in the U.S.
What unites them is they both fit into the shake-your-head category of 鈥渢hey are doing what?鈥� Both reflect an inability or unwillingness to accept the new realities of, on the one hand, a pandemic and, on the other, a climate crisis.
Let鈥檚 start with the 颅Olympics. What is wrong with this sentence, from an article in the sa国际传媒 on May 7? 鈥淧fizer and BioNTech are donating COVID-19 vaccine doses to inoculate athletes and officials preparing for the Tokyo Games.鈥� Well, where does one begin?
First 鈥� Games, what Games? They are holding the Olympic Games a couple of months from now, in the midst of a global 颅pandemic? In a country with a vaccination rate of around one per cent, according to another sa国际传媒 story the next day? A country that has just expanded its state of emergency to cover other regions and extended it until May 31?
When the president of the International Olympic 颅Committee (IOC) had to cancel his trip to Japan on Monday because of the surge in cases? When countries such as India, Brazil and who knows where else are essentially out of control? Hello, IOC 鈥� wake up and face reality.
Second, they are 颅donating these vaccines to the IOC. Donating? Why the heck should vaccines be donated? Does 颅anyone know how rich the IOC is? Its own website says the revenue for the four-year cycle of the last Olympiad from 2013 to 2016 (the Sochi Winter Games and the Rio games), was $5.7 billion. So they can afford to buy their own vaccines.
Anyway, if there are enough vaccines that Pfizer and BioNTech can donate them, I can think of a very long list of way more deserving recipients than a lot of fit young elite 颅athletes. For starters, front-line and essential workers in low-income 颅countries. Whatever else 颅Olympic athletes may be, they are not essential workers. Where is the slightest scintilla of morality in all this?
Moreover, why is the 颅Canadian Olympic Committee accepting this donation? They may try to dress it up as not jumping the queue, not getting the vaccine ahead of vulnerable and essential workers, because they are donated vaccines, but that is tosh. My local supermarket staff 鈥� who are essential 鈥� were not getting the vaccine, so I resent Olympic athletes, and for that matter, all professional athletes, getting it before they do. What the COC should do is re-donate all its donated 颅vaccines to essential workers and vulnerable people and cancel its participation in the Games.
Turning to my second theme, here are a couple of recent 颅jaw-dropping headlines from The Guardian. 鈥淲yoming stands up for coal with threat to sue states that refuse to buy it鈥� (May 7) and 鈥淏ill seeks to make Louisiana 鈥榝ossil fuel sanctuary鈥� in bid against Biden鈥檚 climate plans鈥� (May 9).
Let鈥檚 think about that for a moment. In Wyoming, the state hopes to take 鈥渓egal action against other states that opt to power themselves with clean energy such as solar and wind, in order to meet targets to tackle the climate crisis, rather than burn Wyoming鈥檚 coal,鈥� while the Louisiana proposal would 鈥渂an local and state employees from enforcing 颅federal laws and 颅regulations that negatively impact petrochemical 颅companies,鈥� such as limits on air pollution.
I see endless possibilities here. Perhaps we could sue places that refused to take our old growth lumber or the last of our dwindlng salmon stocks. Maybe tobacco states could sue people who give up smoking, thus depriving them of revenue. Or we could establish a whaling sanctuary so we can get rid of those pesky salmon-eating orca.
Oh, and please don鈥檛 tell Alberta about Wyoming and Louisiana鈥檚 plans, we don鈥檛 need the insanity to spread up here. What we really need is a vaccine against such insanity.
Dr. Trevor Hancock is a retired professor and senior scholar at the University of 颅Victoria鈥檚 School of Public Health and Social Policy.
