Sunday Morning Links

This and that for your Sunday reading.

- In the absence of leaders at any level of government willing to act on the scale needed to stop the coronavirus pandemic in much of Canada, Amir Attaran helpfully provides some minimum standards which could be applied across the country. And Nathaniel Dove and Anna McMillan report on a call from health sector workers for targeted shutdowns to meaningfully bend the curve in Saskatchewan, while Stephanie Taylor reports on the prospect that we could be facing massive increases in our case load by the first week of December.

- Andrew MacLean discusses the need for medical health officers to be able to speak openly and honestly to the citizens they serve, rather than having their messages and recommendations distorted by political considerations. And Gary Mason highlights what the recordings of Alberta meetings showed about the glaring gap between public health recommendations and the UCP's choices and orders.

- Meanwhile, the Progress Report exposes how Jason Kenney's government slipped $4 million to the NHL in a secret, sole-source contract while skimping on relief for Albertans.

- Natalie Kalata reports on the burnout being faced by frontline workers dealing with COVID-19, while Rosa Saba traces the difficulties in part to a lack of basic employment and labour protections. And Gabriela Panda-Beltrani notes that Saskatchewan's contact tracers are facing both understaffing in their workplaces, and deliberate abuse from the people they're trying to contact.

- Finally, Andrew Nikiforuk warns us against assuming that a vaccine will immediately put an end to the work that needs to be done in protecting against the continued spread of COVID-19.