Today in Stupid: Rebel Nurse Zero or Hero?
Sorting the reasonable wheat from the idiotic chaff since 2010.
A Canadian nurse returning from volunteer work in Tanzania refused to wear a mask, take a COVID-19 test or lock herself up in a government-run COVID Hotel, telling a Canada Border Services officer in a video she posted on Instagram, “I am a frontline worker, actually. I’m considered a hero. I’m a registered nurse.”
Q: Is this Stupid? Or reasonable activism?
A: A bit from Column A and a little from Column 2.
Let’s dig in…
Refusing to wear a mask in the airport. Wearing a mask is a reasonable request during a public health emergency. Cloth and disposable surgical masks do not protect the wearer from much – but they may provide minimal protection from larger droplets. However, that’s not why they’re required in public spaces during this crisis. Masks (of almost any description) catch some of the droplets, food particles, and other ephemera ejected from the mouth and nose. No, it doesn’t prevent all potential pathogens from being expelled into the air or onto surfaces. But, it has been quantifiably demonstrated by independent, peer-reviewed research to significantly reduce the risk.
If you want to protect yourself from inhaling the coronavirus, you should choose and correctly wear a properly-fitted N-95/99 mask and keep your face smoothly shaved to allow a tight seal.
For the same reason polite people cover their mouths when they cough, polite people wear a mask when asked to do so. It helps.
Mandatory mask-wearing in public spaces is an infringement of your rights and freedoms – but it is beyond doubt a reasonable and justifiable infringement and therefore not a breach of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Mandatory mask rules at the airport – and on aircraft* – are legal. Compliance is reasonable and polite. Refusing to abide by this rule is STUPID.
*Speaking of aircraft – how did she get on and remain on the aircraft if she was not wearing a mask? Did she wear a mask on the plane, then remove it at the airport just to cause a scene? Also STUPID.
Refusing a COVID-19 test on arrival. Who doesn’t want to know if they’re infected with a potentially harmful, even deadly, communicable virus? Refusing a test is just plain dumb under almost any circumstances.
In this circumstance, she was (a) coming from an area with zero infection control protocols, (b) had been working with sick people for months, and (c) arriving in Canada during a declared public health emergency.
A mandatory screening test is an infringement of your rights and freedoms – but it is beyond doubt a reasonable and justifiable infringement and therefore not a breach of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. In fact, such testing is required under Canada’s Quarantine Act.
Mandatory arrival screening for COVID-19 is legal, and sensible. Refusing to abide by this rule is STUPID.
Once again – she was required to have taken a COVID-19 PCR test prior to boarding her aircraft. Did she refuse that test also? If so, how did she board? If not, is she just making a stink in Canada to rack up her likes on the ‘Gram?
Refusing to lock herself up in a government-mandated Quarantine Hotel at her own expense.
Once again, this government requirement is an infringement of your rights and freedoms. However, this time it is clearly not a reasonable and justifiable infringement. Therefore, (Spoiler Alert: I am not now and never have been a Supreme Court Justice or any kind of lawyer for that matter) it is a clear breach of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
I am emboldened in this belief by the knowledge I have asked the Prime Minister’s Office and the Health Minister’s staff if this requirement is legal – and, if so, based on what legal foundation. Their answer: “we don’t know.” They have never wavered from that response. When someone tells me they’re ignorant, I tend to believe them.
Refusing to enter into a Quarantine Hotel is a REASONABLE response to an unlawful regulation.**
** Refusing such a mandatory quarantine order is reasonable – if you have demonstrated prudent counter-infection behaviours and have tested negative for the COVID-19 virus.
Passengers arriving by air in Toronto – who have followed the rules – will arrive with a negative COVID-19 test in hand. They will then undergo rapid screening on arrival before they leave the terminal. If that arrival test is also negative, they will have two pieces of documented evidence that they are not “infested” (as they say in the Quarantine Act) with COVID-19. With no evidence to the contrary, it is clearly unreasonable for a Screening Officer or Quarantine Officer to order a demonstrably uninfected person into quarantine.
If you test positive for COVID-19 on arrival, it is entirely reasonable and justifiable to be ordered into quarantine – at home, or in a government facility.
If you do not have evidence establishing you are free of infection – as in the case of this woman who refused to be tested – then it is reasonable and justifiable to be ordered into quarantine – at home, or in a government facility. Refusing to do so is STUPID.
It is never reasonable and justifiable for government to required a person detained – for any reason – to pay for the costs of their own detention. Refusing to pay for a Quarantine Hotel is always an entirely REASONABLE response.
A well-reasoned argument... something almost unheard-of these days. Well done!
Disagree. Have a read of Section 14.1 of the Quarantine Act. The tests being administered at Canadian Ports of Entry are ILLEGAL.