The Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has defended his government’s pandemic measures in the face of protests from truck drivers. He was against easing the restrictions, he declared on Wednesday in Parliament in Ottawa. However, several provinces have announced that their corona restrictions will be lifted. Alberta, Saskatchewan, Quebec and Prince Edward Island said they would withdraw some or all of the measures.
Alberta, the most conservative province in the country, is lifting the 2G rule for restaurants immediately and aims to eliminate the mask requirement by the end of the month. Nevertheless, protests by truck drivers in the capital Ottawa and at important border crossings with the USA continued on Wednesday.
The truckers are particularly upset about a regulation for which the Trudeau government is responsible: Since January 15, truck drivers must be fully vaccinated against the corona virus when entering Canada.
Trudeau stood by the measure in a speech in Parliament. The reality is that vaccination requirements and a nearly 90 percent vaccination rate in Canada have ensured that the pandemic has not hit as hard there as elsewhere in the world, he explained.