No one will ever forget the COVID-19 pandemic. It caused us to live in a surreal world, where businesses and churches were closed, and social distancing was routinely practiced. We were required to retreat into our homes. Our whole world stopped in its tracks.

There were some decisions and actions, however, made during this pandemic which will cause future generations to shake their heads in disbelief. Some of these questionable actions and decisions are as follows:

Decision by the World Health Organization (WHO) to Support China Rather than Protect Other Countries

WHO is an arm of the United Nations. Its mission is to provide public health information and assistance, to set international medical standards and coordinate health responses throughout the world.

During the spread of the coronavirus, also called SARS CoV-2, WHO has spectacularly failed in its mission. Instead, it has covered up for China’s failure to contain the pathogen and has pointedly refused to denounce China’s concealment of accurate information about the gravity of the viral outbreak. As of April 7, 2020, this has resulted in over a million cases of the virus in 209 countries and deaths in the tens of thousands.

Why did WHO prioritize China over the rest of the world?

WHO has an annual budget of $3.8 billion U.S. and the United States government and U.S. charities pay 76% of this. By contrast, China contributes only $86 million towards the WHO budget.

Beijing, nonetheless, has made a concerted effort to influence key international organizations, including WHO. WHO’s behaviour during the pandemic to protect China was obvious. For example, in December, WHO was advised of the spread of the virus in Wuhan, China, but waited two months, until March 11, 2020 to declare COVID-19 to be a global pandemic. On February 3, 2020 after the U.S. and other countries blocked travel to and from China, WHO stated, “There’s no reason for measures that unnecessarily interfere with international travel and trade.” Stopping international travel, however, was one of the most important decisions made in order to stop the spread of the virus.

The director general of WHO, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, is the former Minister of Health of Ethiopia, but not a physician – the first time that a non-physician has headed WHO. He is a former member of an Ethiopian communist party – one that the U.S. listed as a terrorist organization in the 1990s. He congratulated China on creating high standards for dealing with the virus and argued, in accordance with Chinese propaganda, that the virus was not communicated in human to human contact. Extraordinary.

Director General of WHO

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was backed by China in May 2017 when he ran for the position of WHO director general. (The previous director general was a doctor from China, Dr. Margaret Chan.) Chinese diplomats worked tirelessly behind the scene to defeat his rivals for the job. His victory was a victory for Beijing.

Spain

Spain elected a coalition government of socialists and communists in January, 2020.

On March 8, 2020, the Spanish government put its political ideology ahead of the public good by encouraging its citizens to participate in more than 75 feminist marches held across the country to mark International Women’s Day. This took place despite the fact that on March 2, 2020, the European Centre for Disease Control and Prevention had advised European countries to cancel mass gatherings of people to prevent the transmission of the novel coronavirus.

The encouragement by the government to attend the feminist marches was utterly reckless. Hundreds of thousands of people participated in these feminist marches. On March 9, 2020 the day after the rally, the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Madrid doubled. Several high-profile attendees later came down with COVID-19. These included Spain’s deputy prime minister, the prime minister’s wife and mother, the wife of the leader of the Communist coalition partner “Podemos”, and also the Health Emergency Chief, Fernando Simon.

By March 14, 2020, the central government of Spain finally announced a nation-wide state of emergency and placed 46 million in quarantine for 15 days. Non-essential travel was prohibited. This lockdown was the strictest in all of Europe. Despite this, Spain became one of the European countries most affected by the virus, which has resulted in Spain being one of the places with the most deaths from the coronavirus. As of April 6, more than 130,000 people had been diagnosed with the disease and more than 12,000 have died.

Italy

One of Italy’s top virologists has stated that Italy was doomed by political correctness because of the country’s response to the coronavirus. Dr. Giorgio Palu, professor of virology and microbiology at the University of Padova and the former head of the European and Italian Society for Virology criticized the Italian government, which had refused to isolate individuals coming from China to Italy because it might be regarded as being racist. The Mayor of Florence, Dario Nardella, even announced a “Hug a Chinese Day”. This announcement was made shortly after the Italian prime minister announced travel restrictions to China.

Italy, particularly the province of Lombardy, a manufacturing centre in Northern Italy, is heavily populated by Chinese because of Italy’s interest in Chinese investment. At the Chinese New Year at the end of January, thousands of Chinese had gone home to celebrate the holiday with their families and then returned to Italy carrying the virus.

As a result, Italy accounts for 30% of all global deaths from this highly infectious respiratory illness. Seventy-four Italian physicians from the Lombardy region have died of the virus. As of April 6, 2020, Italy still had by far, the highest coronavirus death toll – almost 16,000.

Physician-Assisted Suicide

Access to Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) has been disrupted by the coronavirus. Some hospitals have temporarily suspended assisted dying services so that healthcare staff can focus on its pandemic efforts. Efforts to stop the spread of COVID-19 by preserving health care resources for purposes other than deliberately killing patients by MAID, have infuriated the pro-euthanasia organization, Death with Dignity. Further, it is indignant that medical personnel now have had difficulty entering retirement homes and long-term care facilities because of the need to protect patients from the virus. Further, doctors and nurses who participate in assisted suicide do not want to enter people’s homes to provide MAID, as there is no safe way this can be done.

Death with Dignity, however, insists that “a publicly-funded institution should not be able to refuse to provide MAID” even during this pandemic.

Death with Dignity apparently has no concerns about the conflict between deliberately killing people and the efforts to preserve human life.

Abortion

WHO announced at the end of March 2020 that abortion should be considered an “essential service” during the COVID-19 pandemic.

WHO also released a document which stated that women’s choices and “sexual reproductive health care should be respected regardless of their COVID-19 status. This includes access to safe abortion to the fullest extent of the law.”

Canada was quick to pick up on this particular directive, as all ten provinces and the three territories are carrying out abortions, even though restrictions have been placed on providing other elective surgeries.

Abortion facilities are wasting desperately needed equipment, like masks, in continuing their business of killing innocent children during this pandemic. Abortion, in fact, is not and never has been an “essential service”.

Abortion in the U.S.

In the U.S., the abortion issue during the coronavirus pandemic has been highly dramatic. Many states, such as Ohio, Texas and Alabama, have banned the procedure during the pandemic. This brought immediate legal challenges by the abortion industry and its advocates, but not, notably, from women. Judges in Alabama, Texas, and Ohio who have a history of rooting for the abortion industry, overturned the bans. The Court of Appeal in Texas, however, recently restored the ban on abortions during the pandemic.

Abortion clinics want an exemption in order to continue making money. They, however, are not exempt from the risk of spreading the virus in crowded waiting rooms and are using up scarce medical supplies needed to save lives. Despite this, they insist on receiving financial benefits by killing unborn children during the pandemic.

Trudeau Sends Canadian Medical Equipment to China

On March 30, 2020, federal Minister of Health Patty Hajdu stated that hospitals in Canada are rationing mask supplies and other equipment amid the COVID-19 pandemic because Canada “likely did not have enough personal protective equipment ahead of this pandemic”.

It is beyond odd, therefore, that Prime Minister Trudeau, in early February, shipped 16 tonnes of personal protective medical supplies to China. These included masks, gloves and protective gear. This has contributed to the shortage of medical equipment and has placed healthcare personnel as well as vulnerable Canadians at risk of exposure to the virus. Trudeau defended his actions by stating that Canada will obtain equipment from other countries, particularly the U.S. However, U.S. President Trump announced on April 3, 2020, that U.S. manufacturers should not sell their equipment abroad since it would be needed to protect the American public. Sixty-eight other countries have also curbed exports of protective gear and medicines to safeguard their healthcare provision.

It is Canada’s tragedy that Trudeau, in his questionable need to obtain respect and approval from the Chinese government he so admires, has placed Canadians’ lives in jeopardy.

One day we’ll wonder at the insanity of some of the decisions that were made during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.