Hon. Marie-Françoise Mégie: Esteemed colleagues, I am happy to rise to speak at third reading of Bill S-209, An Act respecting Pandemic Observance Day.

I would like to thank all members of the Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology, chaired by Senator Omidvar, as well as the witnesses, for their contribution to the bill. In addition to the extensive testimony we heard and the many briefs we received during the three meetings to study the bill, my colleagues’ comments also helped to improve the legislation.

In light of what I just said, an amendment was made to the preamble to clarify the intentions of pandemic observance day. The preamble was strengthened, and it explicitly acknowledges the multidimensional effects of the pandemic on every person in Canada, the various forms of public health inequality that resulted, and the pandemic’s disproportionate impact on members of historically disadvantaged groups, including Indigenous peoples, racialized communities, seniors and members of the LGBTQ2+ community. The preamble also identifies three reasons for commemorating pandemic observance day. I talked about them before at second reading, but I improved them with input from our witnesses. The three reasons are the following: to get through, to remember and to prepare.

Reason 1: the duty to get through it. During the Second World War, which lasted six years, more than 45,000 Canadians died. Today, after only two years of the pandemic, COVID has taken the lives of nearly 40,000 people, or the equivalent of the population of Nunavut, and there are currently more than 250,000 active cases in the country, or the equivalent of the populations of Nunavut, Yukon and P.E.I. combined.

Our governments certainly took no pleasure in imposing health measures on the Canadian public. Six months ago, when Bill S-209 was introduced, we were on the eve of the fifth wave of COVID-19 in Canada. Today, the sixth wave is receding. When we returned from Easter break, the risk was still considered high by the Public Health Agency of Canada, because of the arrival of Omicron subvariants BA.1, BA.2 and BA.3. During that time, the number of COVID cases doubled in Canada, and the number of deaths rose from 30,000 to 40,000, an increase of 33%.

Despite these statistics, the Public Health Agency of Canada has just amended its epidemiological publications. It is talking about higher and lower risks for Canadians, based on several factors such as vaccinations and available treatments. It is a paradigm shift: We are shifting from collective risk management to individual risk management.

In this regard, an internet site was developed by the National Institute on Ageing, part of what was formerly known as Ryerson University, to help people, based on their age and health condition, understand the factors that contribute to the risk of getting the virus during visits or gatherings. Many of these factors inform us on the risk of contracting other respiratory infections, such as the flu. In three minutes, the calculator can help you assess your risk of catching or spreading viruses.

Does this paradigm shift mean that we will soon emerge from the pandemic? We strongly hope so, especially with the warm weather of the past few days. However, experts are reminding us that the pandemic is not quite over, and thus it is important that we continue to comply with health measures. New variants might still emerge, and, as Quebec’s director of public health has said, a seventh wave is possible. We hope it doesn’t happen. We must continue to be vigilant and do everything in our power to limit the spread of the virus.

That said, here in Canada we have the privilege of having access to several measures to combat the pandemic.

In terms of prevention, we have tests and vaccines available. In terms of treatment, we have drugs to treat COVID-19. On the organizational level, remote work is still helping to slow transmission.

We have independent and trusted public health agencies. The vast majority of Canadians are informed and vigilant. Furthermore, Health Canada just approved the use of a COVID-19 prevention drug for immunocompromised people.

If we remain vigilant, we will improve our chances of making it through.

Scientific studies agree that we will have to continue our efforts on a global scale if we are going to put an end to the pandemic. The only way out is by fighting together.

Reason 2: the duty to remember. There are a lot of people we will have to remember. We must remember our seniors who died of COVID-19 in care homes and experienced a very painful, lonely and undignified end of life. We must remember the families who are grieving, and the already marginalized groups of people who were disproportionately affected by the pandemic. We must remember their lives and their suffering.

We must also remember another group we don’t hear much about, the children orphaned by COVID-19. An article by Isabelle Paré in the daily newspaper Le Devoir, on March 1, had this to say:

The number of children orphaned by COVID-19 has nearly doubled in the past six months, bringing the number of children who have lost a father, a mother or primary caregiver to 5.2 million, or one every six seconds. As many as 2,000 children are estimated to be affected in Canada.

We need to think about them.

We must remember those who were on the front lines, sometimes risking their lives, to care for and support the sick. We must pay tribute to their courage and show them our gratitude. They are our guardian angels.

We must also remember the work and dedication of essential workers in other areas.

There are many of them, and they are often unsung heroes. They work in transportation, driving ambulances, cabs, big rigs and delivery vehicles; teaching and education; food services; security and policing and so on. The list is long. By providing continued service to the public, they helped keep us going during this difficult time. A big thank you to the artists who helped ease our minds during the lockdown and who continued to work even though they could not perform in public.

Let’s also remember the young people who faced serious upheavals in their academic career. The lockdowns strained social ties among young people, causing feelings of isolation and damaging their mental health. This also resulted in an increased risk of dropping out.

Let’s also remember those who have suffered major financial losses, either because their business went bankrupt or because they lost their job. These people will struggle to recover from such economic setbacks.

Let’s remember the general public, the sacrifices everyone made, their resilience and their respect for health restrictions. It’s also important to recognize the outpouring of mutual assistance and solidarity in all of our communities.

The health care system was surprised and overwhelmed by the magnitude of the crisis, and it definitely showed some cracks. In that regard, one of the witnesses at the Social Affairs Committee, Dr. Straus, from the Royal Society of Canada, reminded us to also celebrate all the positive things that have been done over the past two years.

She gave some examples, such as the expansion of the scope of practice and the creation of task shifting teams to look after patients in different settings.

Health authorities adapted to the urgency and uncertainty of the onset of the pandemic. To use an expression heard frequently over the past two years, we were building the plane as we were flying it.

There have been significant advances in research, such as the creation of national platforms, international cooperation on research for large-scale clinical trials and the quick switch of health professionals to virtual care. All this happened in a relatively short period of time. These are good outcomes that deserve to be highlighted and made permanent.

How should we commemorate? Like any day of celebration, this will be a time to pause that will foster reflection and individual and collective action.

The bill gives everyone the freedom to celebrate this day as they wish. This flexibility was appreciated by the witnesses. Many of them told us this when they appeared before the committee.

Individuals and groups can celebrate this day in a way that will reflect the nature and intensity of their suffering, their needs and their cultures.

Witnesses mentioned several times the need to reflect, to gather so as to break the isolation, and to create a place to come together and share. Some people might express their pain, begin the grieving process and share their thoughts in order to suggest solutions for moving forward. Spiritual rites and ceremonies could also be organized.

With today’s technology, various platforms can be used for virtual meetings, collective action and disseminating scientific information. Technology can also be used to raise awareness about mental health and serve as a reminder of the importance of social interaction, as mentioned by Hannah Ehler of the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations.

Community organizations that work with vulnerable people can plan events based on the needs at any given moment, while respecting the cultural traditions of these groups.

For governments, this could be a day of reckoning, a day for discussing what worked and what didn’t work, a day for learning lessons in order to build sustainable solutions for the future.

With such a wide range of potential commemorative activities, and given that the population’s needs shift over generations, this bill is not intended to be prescriptive. That is its strength. Bill S-209 leaves room for the imagination and creativity of individuals and communities.

In her report on the first wave of COVID-19, Quebec’s ombudsman made the following recommendation:

[We must] establish annual events to remember the loss and suffering. That must also be an opportunity to recognize the essential and generous contributions of all those who have carried the burden of service and care during this troubled time.

The Public Health Agency of Canada also affirmed that this kind of global catastrophe must never be forgotten.

La Presse columnist Alice Girard-Bossé wrote an article about those statistics entitled “On a oublié les visages derrière ces chiffres” — we have forgotten the faces behind the numbers. In it, she quotes Dr. Donald Vinh, an infectious disease specialist and microbiologist at the McGill University Health Centre, as follows:

Because of overexposure to data combined with pandemic fatigue, Quebeckers now see these deaths merely as numbers, said Dr. Vinh.

The article goes on to say:

Ève Dubé, a medical anthropologist with the Quebec National Institute of Public Health, the INSPQ, agrees: “It is easy to ignore a number of deaths if you do not stop to think about it. When the dead are not our parents and grandparents, it is very abstract.”

Experts indicate that desensitization has consequences.

According to INSPQ surveys since March 2020, the perception of risk related to COVID-19 has declined steadily.

Social media is also a factor. Today’s news is no longer news tomorrow, and things are quickly forgotten, at the risk of repeating past mistakes.

For example, in March 2022, Italy and Ireland marked a remembrance day for COVID-19 victims.

On March 11, the Premier of Quebec lowered the flag at the National Assembly to half-mast. Other than that, virtually nobody noticed March 11. The pandemic is already being forgotten.

Reason 3: the duty to be prepared. To achieve that, we need an up-to-date picture of the situation. The goal is to do better next time. Alongside the present situation I have been talking about, we are seeing another significant impact. Senator Poirier talked about it earlier: long COVID.

We need to study its impact on our population, our health system and the long-term generational socioeconomic costs of the disease.

Immigration, the backbone of our growth, is another issue that will come up in the post-pandemic period. It has ground to a halt.

More than 1.8 million cases were waiting in the queue as of February 1, according to the immigration minister. This pandemic paralysis is having a significant impact on the economy, which currently has nearly one million jobs to fill. It is also affecting the demographic weight of francophone communities from coast to coast to coast.

The list of actions to be taken to prepare for the future will have to be the subject of more sustained and comprehensive reflection. This could be done in due course, probably by a parliamentary committee, to examine the repercussions of the pandemic.

In this regard, the Auditor General of Quebec tabled a report yesterday that includes an entire chapter on how personal protective equipment was managed during the pandemic. This is a good example to follow.

In response to questions from members of the Social Affairs Committee, the witnesses made some interesting proposals. They called for federal leadership. Basically, we will have to consolidate the gains made and plan for the future in the short, medium and long term.

However, as I already explained, Bill S-209 is not prescriptive, not for the public nor for governments. It allows everyone the freedom to choose how they want to commemorate this pandemic observance day.

In closing, I thank Senator Duncan, our colleagues who spoke about this bill, and the critic, Senator Poirier. I would also like to thank my office staff for their hard work to get this bill to third reading.

Every annual commemoration on March 11 will serve to remind us of what happened, both the tragic events and the display of solidarity and empathy within communities. I am counting on you, colleagues, to make all of this possible by passing Bill S-209, An Act respecting Pandemic Observance Day, and sending it to the other place in order for the legislative process to take its course.

Thank you.

Hon. Marie-Françoise Mégie moved third reading of Bill S-209, An Act respecting Pandemic Observance Day, as amended.

She said: Honourable senators, I was saving my speech for the next sitting of the Senate. I thought that Senator Duncan could move the adjournment.

(On motion of Senator Omidvar, for Senator Duncan, debate adjourned.)

Hon. Marie-Françoise Mégie moved second reading of Bill S-209, An Act respecting Pandemic Observance Day.

She said: Honourable senators, I rise today to begin second reading of Bill S-209, An Act respecting Pandemic Observance Day.

Philosopher George Santayana wrote that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” He is essentially saying that if our world is to move forward, it must learn from and remember the past. We must learn from this pandemic to avoid repeating the same mistakes with another future pandemic or with any coronavirus variants that may yet emerge.

March 11 was chosen because March 11, 2020, was the date on which the World Health Organization officially declared COVID-19 a pandemic. As everyone knows, memories can fade, and establishing a pandemic day responds to the twenty-seventh recommendation of the Québec Ombudsman’s special report on COVID-19 in long-term care homes, which was released last week.

The recommendation states the following:

Propose that there be an annual day of commemoration for the COVID-19 victims and those who worked with them directly or indirectly, in order to remember what they went through during the first wave of the pandemic and the suffering and loss experienced by these sorely affected people.

It is normal for memories to fade over time, which is why Bill S-209 is necessary.

The Québec Ombudsperson entitled her report Identify the causes of the crisis, act, remember. Why commemorate the pandemic anyway?

I see three reasons: the duty to remember, the duty to get through it, and the duty to be prepared for a future pandemic. Our first duty is to remember. Many health care workers in Canada died because of COVID-19.

The Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions has recorded many cases, some of which remain anonymous.

I would like to talk about some of those cases. They are the people who stepped up to help during the pandemic and who did so at the cost of their lives.

Dr. Huy Hao Dao was the first health care worker to die of COVID-19 in Quebec. Dr. Dao was a professor and researcher in the department of community health sciences at the Université de Sherbrooke. One of his achievements was obtaining a grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research for a project to detect opioids in order to “prevent overdoses in people who consume drugs alone at home.” He also supported colleagues working on epidemiological studies to track where people who tested positive for coronavirus contracted it. That’s when the disease took his life. He was 44 years old.

Marcelin François was a father who had recently arrived in Canada with his wife and children via Roxham Road. He was a machine operator in the textile industry through the week and a personal support worker on Saturday and Sunday. He was “dragged” to various seniors’ residences by his “agency.” He died from COVID-19 in April 2020 at the age of 40. La Presse columnist Yves Boisvert wrote the following about Mr. François:

He does not appear on any official lists, since he was neither a government employee nor a union worker. Nor anything else. Although I should say, “pending status”. . . .

In the meantime, they were denied refugee status. When you only seek refuge from misery, you are not a refugee under the law.

Victoria Salvan, who immigrated from the Philippines in the 1980s, had two children and had been working as a personal support worker for over 25 years. She died of COVID-19. She was 64 years old.

Yassin Dabeh was a housekeeping attendant at a long-term care home in London, Ontario. A Syrian refugee who came to Canada in 2016 with his entire family, he died in January 2021 after testing positive for COVID-19. He was 19 years old.

Honourable senators, these individuals who died helping to care for or save the lives of others who were ill from COVID-19 were working on the front lines. They are called “essential workers” or “guardian angels,” an expression our politicians often use to refer to them.

In contrast, other workers, such as security guards, remain an anonymous group that are not really regarded as “guardian angels.” They have not received the same treatment in their immigration cases. It is important to note that people in those jobs are often racialized individuals. They can be found on the front lines, at the entrances to stores, hospitals, long-term care facilities, COVID-19 testing sites and so on. They are taking care to enforce health guidelines to protect the public and contain the virus. Some of these people are verbally and sometimes even physically abused as they work to keep us safe.

We are also thinking about the truck drivers and the delivery people, who work in a sector that has seen marked growth with the rise in home delivery. They are far too often underpaid and undervalued.

In addition to workers, our duty to remember also extends to seniors who were hard hit by the virus in private and public seniors residences, as well as in long-term care centres. These seniors often died far from their loved ones, who were unable to be by their side as they took their last breath.

Given the current COVID-19 numbers in Canada, we can assume that everyone knows someone who has died from the virus. Many people in my office have also recently lost loved ones, either a mother, a grandfather, a grandmother or an uncle from the ravages of this disease.

Closer to home, in this chamber, Senator Josée Forest-Niesing, our late colleague, fought COVID-19 before returning home. I want to express my condolences to her family and her staff.

This pandemic has prevented many from carrying out the rituals of grieving. Far too many people have not mourned their losses. The grieving process, set aside by many, will take time to heal.

Our second duty is to get through this pandemic. With the sudden arrival of the new Delta and Omicron variants, we can see just how much our daily life continues to be far from normal. Until we manage to immunize the vast majority of people on the planet, it will be difficult to overcome this pandemic.

Given the new concerns over variants, there is only one way to emerge from this pandemic, and that is by doing so together. We must ensure that vaccination is accessible in all countries. This will help us combat the variants, restrict their transmission and reduce the rates of hospitalization and death.

Finally, our third duty is to draw lessons from this experience in order to be better prepared for a possible future pandemic.

The pandemic of 1918, known as the Spanish flu, caused the death of 50 million people around the world. That pandemic led to the creation of Health Canada. It is one example of the measures that helped ensure better health for Canadians. We must learn from the COVID-19 pandemic to ensure that we put the right measures in place or change the current system to save more lives and keep people healthy.

Honourable senators, I opted for the legislative approach in introducing this bill. I wanted to ensure that the subject would move forward in both chambers and that we would be able to reach a consensus quickly in order to designate March 11 as pandemic observance day.

In closing, you are familiar with the motto of Quebec, which is attributed to the architect of the National Assembly, Eugène-Étienne Taché: “Je me souviens.” That motto is very relevant today. In the words of former Quebec minister Thomas Chapais:

This motto has only three words, Je me souviens, yet in their simple brevity, these three words rival the most eloquent of speeches. Yes, we remember. We remember the past and its lessons, the past and its misfortunes, the past and its glory.

It is my hope, for the generations of today and tomorrow, that March 11 becomes a time to reflect on the impacts of the pandemic, on how to manage and prevent pandemics, as well as to remember those who have cared for and protected us and all those who have died. Thank you.

(On motion of Senator Duncan, debate adjourned.)

Hon. Marie-Françoise Mégie introduced Bill S-209, An Act respecting Pandemic Observance Day.

(Bill read first time.)