OTTAWA -- Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland says she’s willing to receive a COVID-19 vaccine publicly when it’s her turn, if it helped build public confidence in the safety and efficacy of getting immunized for the novel coronavirus.
“If we were to find ourselves in a situation in Canada where it was reassuring for people, for public figures, for political leaders to be vaccinated, I would of course be very, very happy to be vaccinated if it helped,” said Freeland in an interview on CTV’s The Social on Monday. She added that she’ll be heeding public health advice and waiting her turn like most Canadians.
The National Advisory Committee on Immunization is recommending that residents and staff of long-term care, assisted living and similar facilities; individuals aged 80 years and older; health-care and personal support workers with the highest exposure risk; and Indigenous communities be prioritized for first access to COVID-19 vaccines.
“I would, you know, hate to be jumping the line to get in ahead of any of those highly deserving people,” Freeland said.
While politicians are not being prioritized to receive early doses of COVID-19 vaccines—unless they meet the criteria of being part of an at-risk group—the World Health Organization has suggested that “harnessing social influences” will be key to help build vaccine confidence.
In a recent report, the WHO Technical Advisory Group on Behavioural Insights and Sciences for Health states that vaccine acceptance can be increased, in part, by leveraging trusted and influential figures from relevant communities to advocate for vaccination.
Sometimes, barriers to vaccine acceptance and uptake are the product of unfavourable social influences and/or insufficiently favourable ones,” reads the report in part.
“Multiple groups influence uptake of vaccination, including political decision-makers, immunization programme managers, community and religious leaders, health workers, civil society organizations, media outlets and digital platforms.”
As CNN has reported, former U.S. Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton have volunteered to get their COVID-19 vaccines on camera to promote public confidence in the vaccine's safety, once the U.S. Food and Drug Administration authorizes one.
The Public Health Agency of Canada is working on increasing communications to Canadians so they have the information they need about vaccine safety, in an effort to combat misinformation and vaccine skepticism or hesitancy about COVID-19 vaccines that are being approved in record-setting time.
“I want to assure Canadians that any vaccine approved in Canada will be safe and effective. The regulatory process is ongoing and experts are working around the clock. They will uphold Canada’s globally recognized gold standard for medical approvals,” said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Monday, announcing that Canada will begin receiving initial doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine as early as next week, pending Health Canada approval.
