Hi all, this is overdue, I have been meaning to write this for some time, perhaps the leadership my siblings are showing on our Signal page is spurring me to action, so for that, I thank you. I want to take a little time to talk about covid and vaccines and life and relationships for a bit so please bear with me. I have been remiss in doing this and for that I apologize in advance. I believe I have a point of view, given my current role, that allows me to share a view on the world some might find useful.
Today I find myself as the CEO of Genome Prairie. I have worked in the broad ag industry in a variety of roles for over 30 years before someone trusted me to lead an organization like this and I am humbled by their trust. I am closer to the action of covid, vaccine research and understanding genomics than some might appreciate. What is Genome Prairie you ask? We lead very advanced genomics-based research in Manitoba and Saskatchewan as part of a national network cofounded by the federal govt and the private sector. Over the past 20 years this has amounted to over $360 Million in ag, environmental and animal and human health research in our space. I do not share this to brag but rather to let you know I am in the thick of things, even as it relates to covid research. My company leads a project called CanCOGeN; https://www.genomecanada.ca/en/cancogen as part of the national effort to continue to monitor covid variants of concern, currently the Delta variant. Prior to covid MB and SK did not have the capacity to monitor human health through genomic sequencing. We had neither the equipment, the training or the capacity to do any of that here. We helped purchase and place equipment in Regina and Winnipeg that now allows us to do that. The two provincial health labs sequence about 100 samples a day each day to monitor whether the virus is mutating further from delta so we can stay on top of things and respond accordingly if we do detect mutation as part of a global effort. So far, we have not detected further mutation here. I appreciate using science and data is not really the best path to build trust, it can be hard to make sense of, especially when people feel they have a reason to mistrust based on past misinformation. We have been learning that for over 30 years now with GMO’s, there is all kinds of information online spreading falsehood that GMO canola and glyphosate is somehow unsafe for consumption or the environment. The truth of the matter is this, literally Billions of meals have been consumed around the world over the past decades without a single incidence of sickness or death, nutritionally the food is identical. I have always been proud GMO canola was partially invented by my old boss at Ag West Bio, Wilf Keller, he grew up on the farm in Yorkton and also just happened to be a genius with a passion. Anyone who met Wilf knows quickly, he can be trusted, and he is ethical. Now we must apply that same kind of thinking to the covid vaccines. It has always been about trust and it will always be about trust at the core. So, onto covid vaccines, the original mRNA covid vaccine (Pfizer and Moderna) was co-invented by a woman named Kati Kariko, she grew up poor in Hungary and eventually immigrated to the US where she works at the University of Pennsylvania. She too is a genius, and she has focused on messenger RNA, or mRNA — the genetic script that carries DNA instructions to each cell’s protein-making machinery. She was convinced mRNA could be used to instruct cells to make their own medicines, including vaccines. She worked at this for more than 40 years before perfecting it. I make this distinction because it is critical for even lay people to understand messenger RNA is incapable of changing DNA, it is perfectly safe in that respect. I believe I can trust Kati Kariko. I have had people ask me, why should we trust you, you are not a scientist, and yes that is true, I am not. Those who know me though, know that I am a bit of a geek. My family can attest they called me little professor growing up because I liked to read so much, even over playing scrub sometimes. That part of me has never changed but I have found it important to stay away from focusing too much on online social media type reading where I can’t confirm the source or the accuracy of the information and stick with scientific journals and published papers to get to the facts of things. They can be very hard to understand and often I don’t fully understand but I can usually get to the gist of what they are getting at. So, this brings me to this place, I would ask the hesitant to trust me when I say two things, the vaccines are safe, and they do good in protecting us from the worst symptoms of covid infection. Just like pneumonia, it is not the virus that can kill you, it is the symptoms that happen as a result of catching the virus. This brings me to some final comments. The vaccines will soon be launched for the 5-11 year olds. While this group of people have largely been safe from the worst symptoms of covid when they catch the virus they can spread the virus just the same. It has been largely 75 plus year olds and those with other comorbidities that have been among the some 28,000 who have died from covid in Canada through this pandemic. It has also been largely understood that we will need to get to a minimum of 85% plus fully vaccinated to fully stop this pandemic from moving through the population in wave after wave. Today we sit at 72.766%; https://covid19tracker.ca/vaccinationtracker.html. I believe at this point we will not curb these waves until we exceed 85% fully vaccinated. This means the elderly and the immune compromised will continue to remain at risk indefinitely. What about natural immunity, some will ask, well for comparison purposes, the Spanish flu of 1918-19 killed about 5,000 in Saskatchewan over 18 months, to date Covid has killed just under 800. They had no vaccine in 1918, in 2021 we do. Do not be afraid to have your children vaccinated. So, we have the safe tool to make our world as safe as we know how. It has taken all the accumulated knowledge through all of human history and advancement to get us to this place we are at today. Do we know absolutely everything? No, we never have and most certainly we never will, but we know enough to keep moving forward and that is what we have to do now. No one promised us a life entirely free of risk, from our first breath to our very last. As I have pondered where we find ourselves today in this time, I think often of those who have the wisdom of years and experience ahead of me and I listen to their words closely. Many of my siblings will relate to the stories and advice we heard from our Mom and Dad. Today I think of one piece of advice our Dad would share, often when talking about either fitting in or sticking out in a crowd. All who know him, also know he has never been afraid to stick out in a crowd, but even he would remind us, there are times and places where one must conform, for the good of those around you and for your own self. I believe this is one such time, where for the good of those around us, we must conform. Finally, I will say this, we, together are all stronger, better and more resilient than we could ever possibly imagine. We find ourselves in a time when it is very easy to become divided, we must never allow this tendency to stand divided get a foothold in our most important relationships, that being amongst family, friends and those we care most deeply about. There has never been a more important time to stand together and remember who are real foes are, a pesky virus and those who would seek to divide us through the deliberate and malevolent dissemination of misinformation.
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I grew up as part of a big family on a big mixed farm on the Prairies of Canada. All my opinions are my own. I have an Ag degree from Saskatoon and an MBA from New Brunswick. I am happily married with four children. I love my work, my family and my community and will guard them all ferociously. I try to bring critical thought to all I do and all I say. Leadership through example is the best way forward. |