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REPUBLICA PRESS
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The U.S. Parts With Some of a Vaccine Stockpile It Currently Can’t Use

by

To many Canadians, it seemed decidedly unneighborly. Canada’s initial coronavirus vaccination program moved at a stately pace over the winter, while inoculations in the United States raced ahead. But Washington was unwilling to share any of its stockpile of tens of millions of doses of a vaccine it had yet to approve for use by Americans.

U.S. to Send Millions of Vaccine Doses to Mexico and Canada]

The White House announcement seemed to catch Ottawa officials off guard. Hours passed before Anita Anand, the cabinet minister responsible for buying vaccines, issued a statement that read more like an insurance policy than a note of thanks.

The U.S. Is Sitting on Tens of Millions of Vaccine Doses the World Needs]

Though Canada and more than 70 other countries have approved the AstraZeneca vaccine, the manufacturer hasn’t even applied to the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization. Things have now reached the point, Noah and Rebecca write, that the “United States may only briefly, or never, need the AstraZeneca doses.”

The AstraZeneca vaccine was also the subject of attention this week for another reason. Several European countries suspended its use over a possible connection to blood clots. Canadian officials didn’t share those worries, and late this week the European Medicines Agency declared the vaccine safe.

Aside from a possible new source of supply, the AstraZeneca inoculation received another boost in Canada this week when the federal advisory panel on immunization lifted its previous recommendation that it not be given to people 65 and older.

“a sham and a flagrant display of hostage diplomacy.”

  • One of the more prominent woman in the Canadian Armed Forces quit this week and issued a stinging resignation letter in which she said she had been “sickened by ongoing investigations of sexual misconduct among our key leaders.” I spoke with two veterans about their constant struggles with sexual harassment and even sexual assault while in the military and what they want to see emerge from the investigations into the current chief of the defense staff and his predecessor.

  • From a makeshift studio in the basement of his Toronto home, Matt Granite, the Deal Guy, “now streams daily on Amazon Live, sometimes multiple times a day, covering everything from kitchen gadgets to snowblowers,” Jackie Snow writes. “Under each video is a carousel display of the products he’s discussing. When a viewer clicks that item and buys it, Mr. Granite gets a cut.”

  • The stealthy F-35 fighter remains in contention as the Canadian Forces’ replacement for its CF-18 jets, despite Mr. Trudeau’s killing of a Conservative purchase proposal and restarting of the selection process. The Times’s editorial board argues that the military in the United States should sharply cut down its purchases of the high-tech, and highly expensive, aircraft.

    • A native of Windsor, Ontario, Ian Austen was educated in Toronto, lives in Ottawa and has reported about Canada for The New York Times for the past 16 years. Follow him on Twitter at @ianrausten.

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