Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Winnie Wan Yee Tso et al. study the severity of the Omicron BA.2 COVID variant, and find that its rate of deaths and severe outcomes is no less severe than previous variants in children from 0-11 in particular. Guy Quenneville reports on the connection between the elimination of public health rules and Ontario's spike in cases. Kumanan Wilson examines the history of vaccine passports in Canada, as well as the continuing need for them even as provincial governments abandon them in favour of pandemic denialism. And Russell Wangersky writes that there's no reason for the Moe government to reject an inquiry which would allow Saskatchewan to learn from the pandemic and help keep people healthier.   

- But then, Zak Vescera reports that the Sask Party is continuing to show its lack of interest in avoiding easily preventable deaths by refusing to fund Prairie Harm Reduction. And Connor O'Donovan reports that nine of the people who found refuge in Regina's Camp Hope have died of drug poisonings since it was eliminated. 

- Mitchell Thompson highlights the Ford PCs' plan to demand that health support services in the education system be carried out by staff without health training.

- Kate Aronoff discusses how designing our living environments to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels would produce massive improvements in our quality of life. But in case anybody was hopeful we'd take steps in that direction in Saskatchewan, Bryan Eneas reports that the Moe government is planning to funnel carbon price dollars to the oil sector rather than either allowing people to receive the rebates now available, or investing in a transition to clean energy. And Sharon Riley reports on Alberta's refusal to ensure fossil fuel operators clean up their own messes when they can instead extract profits and leave the public to pay for their liabilities. 

- Finally, Katherine Scott et al. examine whether the supply and confidence agreement between the NDP and Libs may lead to a new Pearsonian era of progressive government. But Geoff Dembicki notes that Pierre Poilievre is looking to plunge both the Cons and our political system as a whole into the Trumpist gutter instead.