Senior army commander says 90% of military personnel are fully vaccinated
CBC
A senior military commander in Western Canada says he doesn't expect much opposition from Canadian Forces personnel over mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations.
Ottawa is requiring federal employees, including members of the military, be fully vaccinated by the end of this month. The government also expects employers in federally regulated industries, including banks and airlines, to do the same.
Brig.-Gen. Bill Fletcher, who's responsible for Western Canada's 3rd Canadian Division, oversees the training of Canadian soldiers and operations from the Pacific Ocean to Thunder Bay, Ont.
There are almost 12,000 regular and reserve forces under his control.
"It's been made very clear by the government that we will follow the same direction that the government has given the public service and we will enforce mandatory vaccines across the Canadian military," Fletcher said in an interview from his office in Edmonton.
He said more than 90 per cent of Canadian military personnel are already double vaccinated and he's not worried about any pushback from what he calls a small percentage.
"We'd already been dealing with the implication for deployments ... of non-vaccinated folks going into a COVID-hot environment or going into an international setting where the host country has said, 'you will be double vaccinated,"' he said.
Intelligence regarding foreign interference sometimes didn't make it to the prime minister's desk in 2021 because Canada's spy agency and the prime minister's national security adviser didn't always see eye to eye on the nature of the threat, according to a recent report from one of Canada's intelligence watchdogs.