Interview with Canadian High Commissioner

In December 2020 the British Medical Journal quietly published an article that revealed this: "Rich countries with only 14 per cent of the world's population have bought up 53 per cent of the eight most promising vaccines, including all of the Moderna vaccine doses expected to be produced over the next year (2021) and 96 per cent of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine doses. It continued "90 per cent of people in 67 low-income countries stand little chance of getting vaccinated against COVID-19 in 2021 because wealthy nations have reserved more than they need and developers will not share their intellectual property."

Canada, which we have long considered a close partner (since the first missionaries arrived here in 1868) and has courted our excellent nurses (as has the UK), was among those countries. Last month when the health sector was buckling, the T&T Registered Nurses Association president Idi Stuart lamented on CNC3 television that frontline workers who were grappling with 'challenging working conditions' here were 'lured' abroad to Canada and the UK.

"The country with the biggest per-capita hoard of the eight vaccines analysed is Canada, which reserved enough for about five complete immunisations per citizen, the Vaccine Alliance found. The United States comes second with roughly four vaccinations ordered per capita. The UK has ordered enough for about three vaccinations (5.7 vaccine doses) per head," the British Medical Journal stated.

Last week Canada's immigration website eased border controls starting July 5: Roughly, it means fully vaccinated travellers with appropriate papers (visas, citizenship, residency etc) and approved vaccines would be allowed entry and required to quarantine.

"To be considered fully vaccinated, a traveller must have received the full series of vaccines—or combination of vaccines at least 14 days before entering Canada. Currently, those vaccines are manufactured by Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD, and Janssen (Johnson & Johnson)."

Sinopharm, although WHO-approved, is not on their list. Over 65 million Sinopharm vaccines have been safely and effectively used in almost a dozen countries. Every WHO-approved vaccine essentially prevents us from hospitalisation and death.

In this wide-ranging interview with IRA MATHUR, Canadian High Commissioner to T&T Kumar Gupta answers crucial questions on vaccine diplomacy.

It's unusual to see an Indian origin High Commissioner yet Canadian born and bred, a graduate of Queen's and the University of Calgary, and been in the Foreign Affairs for 20 years. What do you say to people who remark that you could be mistaken for the Indian High Commissioner?

You're looking at the face of Canada. It may be perceived to be unusual but shouldn’t. If you walk in Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal you would see many faces like mine, and that's who we are today. Canada is built on immigration. This is the face of Canada, where up to 40 per cent of the people are either not born there or are from different ethnicities.

All your experience seems to have made you an ideal observer of our small islands. You’ve served as Canada's ambassador to Zimbabwe, Botswana and Angola from 2015 to 2017. What do you make of the people of our islands drawn from all continents?

Three of my assignments were in Africa. Canada's multicultural is like T&T but here it's built into genetics through intermarriage. You walk down the street and see it in people's faces. People have crossed cultures in their blood and bones. Once you hit that stage, crossing cultures in your blood there is no going back, and you’ve locked multiculturalism and diversity. It’s a marvel.

What changes on July 5 regarding entry to Canada? Why is Sinopharm excluded from the approved vaccines?

There is no change in who is allowed into Canada. The borders are closed. The people allowed to re-enter have always been permitted citizens, including permanent residents, immediate family members, students, and essential workers–and the latter two need visas. Their entry doesn't depend on their vaccination status, but they will not have to go into full quarantine for 14 days. Everyone gets a PCR on arrival, and all that changes is this will be waived for fully vaccinated people legally allowed to enter the country. Regarding Sinopharm being excluded from that list, every country has its regulator that makes decisions regarding vaccines. The GOC (Government of Canada) will continue to revise border measures to reflect this especially as it’s a fast-changing situation.

At the recent G7 summit in the UK, your PM, Justin Trudeau, pledged 13 million surplus vaccines to help the world get immunised against COVID-19. How much of this will get to Caricom, specifically T&T, struggling with an overwhelmed health system?

All the distribution will be through COVAX.

In addition, your PM announced that Canada paid for the purchase and distribution of 87 million doses through money already sent to the ACT-Accelerator, a global programme to make sure the entire world has access to COVID-19 testing, treatments and vaccines. The PM's Office provided a breakdown showing more than seven million of the donated doses are from pharmaceutical firm Novavax, whose vaccine remains in clinical trials and has yet to be approved for use in Canada. Last month, the company said it expected to start delivering doses in the third quarter of 2021. Why offer vaccines that are still on trial?

Firstly, given its initial trials, Novavax promises to equal and exceed the efficacy of currently approved vaccines. Its phase three results are outstanding with efficacy rates reportedly 96 per cent in its first trial and 90 per cent against variants and fewer side effects than most vaccines. Novavax uses a similar approach as the hepatitis B vaccine, used in the US since the '80s.

That said, Canada would never offer anybody vaccines that were not WHO approved and COVAX would never ship vaccines not WHO approved. A win in T&T is a win in Canada in public health. Canada believes our vaccines must be shared, and we are here to ensure that broad support.

Between them, G7 countries (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the US) have bought up 70 per cent or more of the world's available vaccines. G7 leaders confirmed their intent to donate more than one billion doses to low-income countries next year. But the commitment falls far short of the 11 billion doses the WHO said is needed to vaccinate at least 70 per cent of the world's population and end the pandemic. From the outside, G7 look like a cocktail party for the rich. Where does Canada stand on this?

G7 is just one forum. There are many other broader tents, including India, China-Brazil, Latin America, the Caribbean, and other countries. We are in this together. We are always in it together. The pandemic drives that point home, and we need to have broader participation among countries able to support the provision of COVID supplies, vaccines, and therapeutics cutting across all borders.

What's it like being a diplomat during a pandemic?

It's been tough but with unexpected silver linings. I learned about myself, my colleagues, and my work. I arrived in December 2019, before Christmas. Kind people invited me to an old year's party. January was a lot of work. I presented credentials, worked on our prisons support programme, visited Tobago, met key officials. In February, I took part in a Carnival, then COVID arrived, I met some people once, yet those friendships carried me through lockdown, which speaks to the Trinbagonian character.

I was touched by the warmth from Trinbagonian friends, which helped me survive and thrive.

The pandemic has put its shade on all projects. Our trade representative working with Canadian companies, his mandate changed to procure PPE, and that's not classic trade cooperation. This is happening globally. We understood getting hands-on PPE, vaccines, aid became very important. We worked with the TTPRS and the prisons and armed forces to support them. This is new diplomacy. In 2020, we used a Canadian military jet to transport PPE from Panama to POS.

How do you rate your country's performance in this pandemic?

They did the best they could with the knowledge they had. No effort was good enough. Nobody fully prepared anywhere in the world. Everyone's personal experience was different. If you are young and vaccinated, it's different to if you lost a parent, uncle or aunt.

As cases rose in March 2020 all of Canada's provinces and territories declared emergency lockdown states, resulting in active cases beginning to steadily decline, reaching a plateau of inactive cases in mid-February 2021. Currently, we have 1.4 million active cases and over 26,168 deaths and about five million or 13 per cent of our population is vaccinated. In October last year, we bet on Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna–advance contracts with vaccines that may have never come to fruition. It was a gamble. It's hard to know the best decision. Hindsight is 2020. When this is all over governments will clearly assess what we did right or wrong. Now we do our best.

You're a graduate of environmental studies. We are a small island state. Given the vulnerability of our islands to the environment, what would you like to see in T&T?

T&T is not eligible for social assistance, but we have a regional programme to which we have contributed $82 Canadian for Caribbean environmental response. We also have a $3 million Caribbean disaster management fund. We have spent 77k Canadian in Tobago and four million Canadian on the health sector. Through PAHO, we are doing as much COVID relief as possible Caribbean-wide.

In 2014 we contributed 2.4 million to CARPHA, with which they built the lab used today to test for COVID-19. Our warm relationship continues with our motto that a win for T&T–be it for COVID-19, security, development, environment–is a win for Canada.