Some doctors have become policy advocates and political actors during the pandemic, sparking concern they have overstepped the bounds of their expertise..Marco Navarro-Genie, founder of the Haultain Research Institute (and Western Standard columnist), bemoaned how government health officials have turned their non-partisan offices into activist platforms—especially during the pandemic..“Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, is the most politicized of them all. She’s just a lap dog for Justin,” Navarro-Genie said. “She’s just a voice piece because she’s inept.”.Some Tam statements especially incensed Navarro-Genie, who co-authored “COVID-19 the Politics of a Pandemic Moral Panic.”.“The job of doctors is to cure people, to look after their health. But more and more, they’re seeking to expand that fear. Tam has been giving advice [that] people should masturbate — instead of having sex with other people, for example. That’s not a health issue. And she’s been advising about socioeconomic disparities and making pronouncements, all kinds of things about that,” he said..Last August, Tam said all options must be considered to deal with the opioid crisis, including, “moving toward a societal discussion on decriminalization.” In October, she wrote “From Risk to Resilience: An Equity Approach to COVID-19,” where she described how a “health equity approach” is crucial for recovery..“We understand often racialized, often women, working in precarious situations, may be single parents, are trying to essentially look after our elderly and our most vulnerable populations,” Tam wrote..Navarro-Genie said elected officials who would normally vigorously defend freedoms have stood down to doctors’ the pronouncements of increasingly partisan government health officials. .“Legislators have grown more and more and more cowardly … their calculation is we have nothing to gain from standing up against the lockdowns because all the snowflakes have the high ground and they can accuse you of wanting to kill granny and what have you. So, I’m terribly disappointed with a bunch of MPs, some of whom are friends of mine.”.Toronto’s medical officer of health, Dr. Eileen de Villa, and some nurses wanted Doug Ford to force private companies to offer paid sick leave at their own expense. After it appeared he might give in, Ford formally refused Monday..Author and columnist William Gairdner told the Western Standard some doctors don’t recognize the limits of their knowledge..“They begin to feel because they have prestige in one field, they have prestige in every field. And they start saying the stupidest damn things about political life or moral life,” Gairdner said..Gairdner says James Watson provides a glaring example of a brilliant mind with a moral deficit. Watson won a Nobel Prize in 1962 for helping discover the structure of DNA. But in 2007, he told the Sunday Times he was “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because they were less intelligent than whites. He also defended infanticide, especially for handicapped children..Gairdner once challenged a medical foundation over concerns political correctness might play a role in award recipients..“A new president took over and she decided the foundation should be advocating for equity, diversity and inclusion,” Gairdner recalled. .“I just went nuts…I said that I’m not sure you understand what terms like ‘equity’ mean, which is locating an oppressed class and making up for some deemed oppression by an oppressor class. And I said, ‘That means you’re going to start giving … a wonderful reward to people you think would have won if they just hadn’t been oppressed …..“You are automatically demoting every winner [chosen in the past] because you’re implying they only won because they were beneficiaries of an oppressive system. Is that what you intend to say?” .Gairdner said his reasoning prevailed. .“I’m happy to say there was a rethink.”.Elsewhere, politics continues to spill over into medicine. A 2018 article in the Canadian Medical Association Journal reported: “The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada supports advocacy as a core competency of medicine” and “Ontario and Alberta’s regulatory colleges encourage advocacy as an important component of the doctor-patient relationship.”.In 1960’s Star Trek Original Series, Bones would have said, “I’m a doctor, not a politician!” In an interview, political science professor Nelson Wiseman said many health bureaucrats aren’t even doctors anymore..“You can be a public health authority without having to have been a licensed medical doctor. Once upon a time we didn’t have such people. Doctors once treated lung cancer, but did not connect it with smoking or air quality. That has all changed. We now have experts on smoking who have never practiced doctoring,” Wiseman said..The professor believes a balance is found when politicians and officials assume their proper roles..“Handing over the reins is not the same as surrendering the reins. I see no ethical pitfalls or jurisdictional issues. Bottom line: politicians are responsible.”.Lee Harding is the Saskatchewan Political Columnist for the Western Standard
