Writer and committed citizen, the author is president of the governing board of an elementary school. She taught literature at college, is a member of the editorial board of Quebec letters and co-wrote and co-edited the collective essay Shock treatments and tarts. Critical assessment of the management of COVID-19 in Quebec (All in all).
“Even if you catch it, it gives you a cold, more or less. This statement by François Legault, fresh out of his COVID isolation, has makes you jump. If even our prime minister doesn’t take SARS-CoV-2 seriously anymore because his little personal experience with the disease has been mild, who will? Never have health personnel been forced to work by a ministerial decree because of a “cold”, never have cancer operations been postponed because of a cold, never have hordes of patients been have seen their cognitive abilities decline and their breath possibly slip away forever due to a cold. COVID is not a cold, this is what specialists have been striving to explain, with pedagogy, to conspirators and resistant to vaccination for two years.
Saying the opposite when you are at the head of a province is a slap in the face of all the people whose lives have been shattered by the virus, of all the people who have lost a loved one because of this disease. Such a declaration denies their experience, dismisses their suffering out of hand and at the same time thwarts the efforts of all these doctors, intensivists and immunologists who educate the population with patience and dedication. In short, to say that COVID “is just a cold” is dumb. gaslighting pure – and the Legault team is unfortunately not at its first feats of arms in this area.
The term comes from the American film gas light, in 1944, in which a man quietly lowers the intensity of the gas lights in the house, which his wife, camped by Ingrid Bergman, notices of course. However, he denies the phenomenon, making her believe that she is crazy to better manipulate her. “No dear, the lights don’t fluctuate, so what are you going to think?” »
This is what the government has been playing for a few months. While he is behind the wheel and it is his responsibility to implement solutions, not only to reduce the circulation of the virus but also to support health personnel, he turns his head away. Worse still, since January, he has been chanting the words “move around, there is nothing to see, the virus has evolved, it is no longer COVID as before, we now have to live with it”.
Meanwhile, immunocompromised people and patients unable to get a consultation because they developed long-lasting COVID are piling up, screaming in the desert, raging — as are overwhelmed healthcare workers paying broken pots. And that’s even more true since the CAQ has gone into electoral mode and its social networks have turned into a festival of sparkling announcements, where pride flows even more than in normal times — which doesn’t is saying something.
Repeated cognitive diversion
“It is important to remain united, to show kindness and empathy with the pandemic. The @madosedamour movement was initiated by three experienced nurses who are concerned about the morale of their colleagues. It’s really a nice idea. This tweet from François Legault was posted on February 5, 2022 in support of health care workers who are out of breath…Letting the virus run is the decision of the government. However, this leads to the overload of the health system and the adoption of decrees which in particular oblige the personnel to cancel their vacations.
Call for benevolence and empathy when it is we who have the tools to change things? When could we concretely take benevolent and empathetic actions? Gaslighting. Even more so when this message is written the day after the launch of the “Mobilized to be paid” campaign by the Fédération interprofessionnelle de la santé du Québec (FIQ).
The acting national director of public health is also having fun with the lights of the health instructions these days. After encouraging people to come out of isolation after five days, a decision decried by virologists because essentially economic in a context of lack of manpower, now Dr. Boileau is changing his tune. “The period when you can be contagious is ten days. […] No time to go to restaurants, shows, sports activities, bars or to sing. »
It’s true, of course, but it’s enough to freak out when you’ve spent weeks being told the opposite… and this also applies to specialists, who are fed up with these 180 communication degrees that are so easy to avoid. : the five days have always been arbitrary, never based on science. Why pretend otherwise? At the beginning of the week, the Dr Boileau continued his ride by saying that the surgical mask was enough to protect, that the N95 mask was difficult to wear and, sparks in sight, that there was no transmission in schools!
Rendered there, anyone who does not let himself be lulled by these false speeches is a little Ingrid Bergman. Confusion reigns, dark circles deepen and sickness swells, as our leaders renew for the 107and times the state of emergency.
Like Plato’s Pharmakon, the Legault team is both the poison and the remedy… Except that this second is becoming increasingly rare these days. The statement “Even if you catch it, it gives you a cold” testifies to an individual reality. To make it a general rule when you’re prime minister is irresponsible, as many doctors have pointed out.
I also leave the final word to one of them: “The most ironic thing is that the government is taking up the arguments that the Holocaust deniers used at the start of the pandemic. The PM should have said his COVID was mild because he was triply vaccinated. We feel helpless. So do we, doc.
And no doubt also the relatives of the thirty people whose deaths were reported yesterday.