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6 durhamcitizen.ca September 21, 2021

EDITORIAL “ O’Toole needs to make his case to caucus and to the party faithful. He surely knows this and will no doubt do it.
Because if he can’t keep the confidence of his own party, he has no chance of winning the confidence of the nation.

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TO MAKE HIS CASE
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It’s only natural for there to be a debate The U.S. anti-vax movement is
already surfacing as to whether or not
Erin O’Toole should remain as the
leader of the Conservative Party of
Canada. contaminating Canada
In fact, this question is so natural that
it’s embedded into the CPC rules, and
to the rules of many political parties in
Canada and abroad. It’s called a Police arrested a man and a woman and charged them with assault in relation to an anti-vaccine
leadership review. protest at the Eaton Centre in Toronto. Videos circulating on social media show police and security guards
A lot of parties stipulate that if a leader trying to block protesters from entering the mall without masks, in violation of public health measures.
fails to win an election, they must be
subjected to a review. It’s nothing
personal. It’s just the rules. Well, it has finally happened. News this approximately two-thirds of the anti-
When it comes to the federal week of widespread and disruptive anti- vaccine disinformation in America.
Conservatives, based on their current vaccine protests at Canadian medical The third is Russian propaganda, which
schedule of events, O’Toole will likely centres means that America’s destructive, promotes anti-vaccine disinformation as a
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face a leadership review in 2023 – when self-defeating and totally nonsensical anti- Commentary means to destabilize the U.S. and other
the party is scheduled to have its next vaccine movement has begun crossing the democratic countries, possibly including
policy convention. border. Canada.
That said, there are also ways that the As a pediatrician, vaccine-scientist and Peter Hotez MD PhD I don’t have a good sense of what’s driving
Conservative caucus of MPs can trigger parent of an adult daughter with autism and anti-vaccine sentiments in Canada, and
an earlier leadership convention when intellectual disabilities, I have had a front- whether they are similarly linked to health
they meet in October. row seat to America’s anti-vaccine preservative formerly contained in many freedom or far-right leanings. But it worries
All of this is to say that there’s no need movement for the last two decades. I’m also vaccines, or spacing vaccines too close me, especially given what has happened in
to rush this question. a lead target, and sometimes known as the together and even alum adjuvants. Each the U.S. where anti-vaccine expressions are
There are arguments to be made on 'OG Villain' for writing the book, Vaccines time we debunked their claims. often accompanied by vile Nazi imagery,
both sides. O’Toole performed well in Did Not Cause Rachel’s Autism a few years As the anti-vaccine movement began to lose and authoritarian attitudes. This type of
that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau back. steam, they re-energized by acquiring a anti-science aggression even extends to
thought he’d win a majority but instead When I learned of this, I had to Google it — political dimension. Starting around 2014, targeting prominent U.S. scientists and
he still faces a minority. Plus, the OG means 'original gangster.' My gangster they linked to the Republican Tea Party seeks to delegitimize our expertise.
Conservatives won the popular vote. status has since accelerated,when our rallying around libertarian slogans, I hope things do not degenerate further in
More Canadians cast a ballot for research group at Texas Children’s Hospital including 'health freedom', which became Canada. I love the Canadian people. My
O’Toole’s party than they did for and Baylor College of Medicine developed a especially strong in Texas. Large numbers grandfather, Morris (aka Maurice, aka
Trudeau’s Liberals. global health COVID-19 vaccine now being of parents opted their kids out of Moishe) Goldberg, grew up in the Jewish
Besides, Stephen Harper lost the 2004 scaled for production in India and vaccinations in the 18 states that permitted Quarter of Paris, but later immigrated to
election only to come back next time, Indonesia. non-medical exemptions for personal Montreal in the 1920s, well ahead of the
win, and have an enduring legacy as The brief modern history of the anti- belief reasons. Nazi occupation in France. I often say, the
Prime Minister. vaccine movement in America goes This 2.0 version of the anti-vaccine only reason I exist is because of the
There are those who will want to argue something like this: It began following the movement remains with us today. Starting goodness of the Canadian people who
the other side though, and say that publication of a British clinical study in 2020, health freedom expanded to mask accepted my grandfather. In return, I’m a
O’Toole only deserves one shot. He published in The Lancet, which is a and social distancing protests as far-right life-long Habs fan, and there aren’t too
didn’t deliver results any better than prestigious medical journal, in 1998. It elected members of the US Congress and many of those here in Texas.
Andrew Scheer did and also pushed the claimed that the measles-mumps-rubella several red-state governors openly But I wish you the best in dealing with what
party too far away from its conservative (MMR) vaccine, which is a live virus questioned either the safety of vaccines, or is to come. Watch out for it. In the U.S., anti-
convictions. vaccine, has the ability to replicate in the a n y t y p e s o f COV I D - 1 9 v a c c i n e vaccine groups can become extremely
The answer to this isn’t to be hasty large intestines of children and somehow requirements. aggressive and hostile, and increasingly
though. It’s to talk it out. And the main this led to what was then called pervasive Not being vaccinated against COVID-19 they are imbued with far-right extremist
person who should be talking it out is developmental disorder, a term formerly became a new badge of allegiance to ideologies and zeal. They also love their
O’Toole himself. O’Toole needs to used for autism. conservatism. The result? Devastating Nazi imagery.
make his case to caucus and to the Ultimately, the results were shown to be co n s e q u e n ce s. Ro u g h l y 1 0 0 , 0 0 0 Good luck. You didn’t deserve this.
party faithful. He surely knows this and invalid, and the paper was retracted by the unvaccinated Americans have lost their
will no doubt do it. journal editors. However, the retraction did lives to COVID since this spring. Peter Hotez MD PhD is a Professor of
Because if he can’t keep the confidence not officially occur until 2010, and so during Today, the anti-vaccine movement has Pediatrics and Molecular Virology at
of his own party, he has no chance of t h e 2 0 0 0 s , m a ny p a re n t s b e g a n three major drivers. One of them is anti- Baylor College of Medicine where he is also
winning the confidence of the nation. withholding vaccines from their children. science aggression from the far-right, as the Texas Children’s Hospital Chair in
So Conservatives would be well- Even after the biomedical community highlighted above. However, there are also Tropical Pediatrics. His latest book is
advised to let O’Toole make his case debunked MMR vaccine-autism links, anti- at least a dozen non-governmental groups Preventing the Next Pandemic: Vaccine
and rally the troops around him. vaccine groups ramped up their assertions. identified by the Centre for Countering Diplomacy in a Time of Anti-science
They claimed it was the thimerosal D i g i t a l H a t e a s r e s p o n s i b l e f o r (Johns Hopkins University Press)
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