Even though I live in the open-air asylum known as America (I hate being cold, I’ll admit it) I still pay attention to what’s happening back home in Canada regarding the pandemic, mostly so I can tell when it’s safe to travel back to visit family.
As in the US, Covid vaccination has become a hot political topic and most of the provinces have mandated vaccine passports for public spaces while others have not. British Columbia mandated them several weeks ago while neighboring Alberta decided that it would forgo passports and instead offer incentives for vaccination compliance.
Well it doesn’t take Carmac the Magnificent to figure out the results.
From The Globe and Mail:
While Alberta tried lotteries and $100 cash cards to entice vaccination holdouts, B.C. health officials, along with those in Ontario, Quebec and other provinces, calculated that it would take a tougher policy to boost rates. This week, after repeatedly ruling out such a policy, Alberta and Saskatchewan announced their own vaccine passport systems. And it seems Alberta is finally getting results.
In the three weeks since the policy was announced, more than 20,000 British Columbians between the ages of 18 and 24 have had their first shot of the vaccine – a significant jump in turnout from the trend over the summer. Just 351 individuals in that age group had registered for a vaccine the day before the announcement. The day after, registrations jumped to 2,030, and an average of 1,000 people have signed up every day for the past three weeks.
In contrast, Alberta’s incentive programs – starting with a lottery announced at the beginning of the summer and then, more recently, gift cards – have had little effect on boosting the province’s comparatively low vaccination rates. Provincial statistics show the lottery scheme did not prompt a wave of people to book appointments when it was announced in June, and the gift card announcement was followed by a noticeable but relatively small increase in bookings.
The day after Alberta reversed course this past Wednesday and announced a form of vaccine passport, bookings tripled to more than 25,000, Premier Jason Kenney said.
So yeah, looks like the stick works better than the carrot. Who knew?
Seventy-five percent of Canadians have had at least one shot while 69% are fully vaccinated.