There have been plenty of stories about dying anti-vaxxers confined to an ICU death bed repenting and pleading with family and friends to get vaccinated; that they had it all wrong and if they could do it over again would run to a vaccine clinic.
What we haven’t heard of, and we won’t, is an anti-vaxxer in the same dire end-of-life situation saying he or she has no regrets about not getting vaccinated and would do it all over again.
* Some have suggested that anti-vaxxers and COVID-19 deniers should be required to sign a waiver: If they are admitted to hospital with COVID-19, they get the bill, if they leave the hospital standing up. Of course, a COVID denier could argue that he can’t have a disease that doesn’t exist.
* Then there is the Jesus will find me a parking space and protect me from COVID mindset. Some evangelical preachers in the U.S. and Canada are feeding the don’t need the vaccine gospel to their flocks. However, according to Scripture, when the disciple Timothy complained about a stomach ailment, he wasn’t told to just have faith and pray. Instead, he was told to treat it (with a little wine).
* In the last two years, COVID-19 has killed five times more U.S. law enforcement officers than gun fire. At last count, 740 officers have succumbed to COVID-19 infections and thousands others recovered after long hospital stays. Yet, many police union bosses have railed against mandatory vaccinations for their members. One union leader claims that the COVID death numbers are being skewered to “encourage” vaccinations.
* Of all the people who have been admitted to hospitals in the Eastern Ontario Health Unit region with COVID-19, 73% were not fully vaccinated. And when it comes to patients being so ill they have have to be placed in the intensive care unit, some on ventilators, as of this week not one was fully vaccinated.
* There are three groups when it comes to vaccinations: Hard-core anti-vaxxers said to make up three percent of the population but are the most vocal, vaccine-hesitant (aka fence-sitters) and believers.
THIS MONTH IN 1967 – Ontario’s first group foster home for boys aged 12-18 was to be built in Cornwall on a five-acre parcel of land in Eamer’s Corners. To be called Cornwall Youth Residence, it would accommodate 18 boys most of whom would be directed to the residence by the court system. Magistrate P. C. Bergeron called it a “dream come true.” He said few youths sent to training schools by the court system were rehabilitated. … The president of the Ontario Public School Trustees’ Association told convention delegates meeting in Cornwall that it was time for one school board “free from prejudice and pressure.” The next day the deputy minister of education said schools in the province should operated year-round. … At age 100, Orrin Wylie of Williamsburg Township was the oldest person in the United Counties to vote in the provincial election. He said he voted the way he has voted all his life – Conservative. “Why change now?” he told reporters. … The United Church of Canada joined other Christian churches to oppose a plan by the federal government to allow municipalities to operate lotteries as a way to increase tax revenues. The United Church said lotteries promoted the “insidious philosophy” that citizens could get something for nothing. Lotteries, it said, were harmful to public moral. Nothing was said about church operated bingos, a staple of many Roman Catholic parishes.
Central Public School teacher Don Russell was elected president of the Cornwall Public School Teachers’ Association. The association represented teachers at 10 city public schools. … General Vanier Secondary School, the city’s newest high school, held a public open house with 6,000 people attending. The $4 million school featured a 600-seat auditorium. … The provincial government said construction of a new Highway 138 connecting Cornwall and the new freeway linking Ottawa with the Quebec border would begin within three years. … City council approved construction of a swimming pool at St. Joseph’s Park at a cost of $65,000. Tennis courts were approved for the Athletic Grounds. … Citizenship court at the United Counties building saw 16 city and area residents receive citizenship certificates. Three of the 16 were from Cornwall. … Raymond Gatien, 18, of Cornwall was awarded the Clifford Beach Memorial Bursary. He was a second-year honours student at McGill University. Today, he is Dr. Raymond Gatien. … Larry Murphy of Long Sault was elected president of the St. Lawrence College student council. Paul McLellan was vice-president. … Joe Menard was promoted to circulation manager of the Standard-Freeholder. … Devitt Fuels, in the city since 1938, was sold. It became G. Kaneb Fuels. … Reduced fares and special fare days were the best city council members could come up with to help Cornwall Street Railway fend off mounting red ink in its transit division. CSR official Don Seymour told council the steady decrease in transit users, especially among Howard Smith Paper Mill and Courtaulds employees, threatened the system. He said one survey showed just four passengers from each mill using the system.
HERE AND THERE One of the wackiest ideas to land on the city council table (from a consultant, of course) was submitted for consideration 20 years ago. It proposed making Cornwall Canal navigational for pleasure craft. It involved building a lock at the dyke and extending the canal to the St. Lawrence River. The estimated cost at the time was $20 million. Of course, the swift current between the mainland and Cornwall Island wasn’t considered. …
What’s with these loud car mufflers? … I’m still trying to wrap my head around the Cornwall Police Board decision to pay for an acting police chief while it still had a chief under contract (to end of December)? … Federal Health minister Patty Hajdu urged the unwashed not to travel across the country unless it was necessary. She forgot to send the memo to her boss, Tofino Trudeau.
TRIVIA What was the first TV show to show a toilet on screen? 1) Leave it to Beaver, 2) Bonanza, 3) All in the Family, 4) Laugh In, 5) I Love Lucy.
TRIVIA ANSWER The most watched TV show in 1955 was the $64,000 Question. Contestants were selected from the audience. The quiz show was cancelled after it was discovered that producers had rigged it to prevent a female contestant from winning the grand prize.
QUOTED – “A consultant to be worth his salt must give honest judgments not necessarily those which he thinks the client would like to hear.” – Andrew Thomas