With an upcoming meeting of the World Trade Organization’s Council on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property scheduled for next month, it is not too late for wealthy countries including Canada to do the right thing and support the temporary waiving of intellectual property rights to enable poor countries to import cheap generic versions of patented COVID-19 vaccines—and save many lives in the process.

Liberal members of Parliament will tell you that they truly support pharmacare, but that they just don’t like the way the NDP is going about it. But, as Christo Aivalis explains, the reality is far clearer. Like with the wealth tax, the Liberals see a popular policy that their own base supports, but it is one which clashes with their core neoliberal ideology. In the end, allegiance to the latter is what matters.

Long-term care facilities in have been decimated by the COVID-19 pandemic, with almost three-quarters of all pandemic-related deaths in Canada occurring within them. But there’s another type of institution in Ontario that is somehow even less regulated and less transparent than long-term care facilities: residential service homes, also known as domiciliary hostels, which are privately run and operate for profit.

Unmasked police officers are a public health hazard. If the Winnipeg Police Service is concerned about maintaining its legitimacy, it will mandate all officers to wear a mask while on duty at all times. And, if the provincial government truly cares about public health, it will ensure everyone, without exception, is respecting public health orders.

As COVID pushes more people into poverty, the Charter’s limits must be recognized. But doing so requires greater care in our discussions. Civil liberty groups should continue to litigate, but they should also be more specific in what the Charter can and cannot do. This would provide space for extra-legal solutions, such as protests and mutual aid. Otherwise, those who use the Charter will unknowingly contribute to the problems they are fighting to end.

The pandemic will continue to shape our lives for a long time to come yet. However, even when it is finally behind us, the economic fallout and deeper problems of global capitalism will be left in its wake. As workers and as members of communities under attack, we are going to have to be able to assert the popular will through powerful and united social movements.

While it is undeniable that the virus has reached a critical stage in recent weeks, the adoption of authoritarian measures ought to be viewed critically. With this latest lockdown, the Québec government has failed to show humanity by policing the health crisis and putting vulnerable people at increased risk. In particular, Legault’s refusal to exempt unhoused people from the curfew only accentuated the inequities spawned by the pandemic.

Green Party leader Annamie Paul thinks Canada should take over hosting duties for the 2022 Olympics Games, citing China’s human rights record and treatment of its Uighur and Muslim minority populations. This is a terrible idea. It ignores the role of Canada in perpetuating ongoing genocide of Indigenous peoples and fundamentally misunderstands the role of the Olympics in furthering the goals of settler states the world over.

Governments need to do a better job of caring for disabled people during the vaccine rollout. But prioritizing their access to the shot will mean making the vaccines public, and putting an end to for-profit models of health care delivery in Canada and beyond. We must mourn those who have been killed by institutionalization, pandemic profiteering and government inaction, and fight to keep each other safe.

Are you tired of COVID? I fucking am. But as a longtime science writer and the author of two books on pandemics, I have to report what you probably don’t want to hear. We have entered the grimmest phase of this pandemic. And contrary to what our politicians say, there is only one way to deal with a rapidly mutating virus that demonstrates the real power of exponential growth: Go hard. Act early. And go to zero.