Stress Testing Canada

On Seeking a Sustainable Equilibrium

This post is by Linda Blade, Ph.D., Sport Performance Professional, who is writing from her home in Edmonton, Alberta.

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From my vantage point as an athletics coach, the Freedom Convoy 2022 seems to be functioning as a kind of stress test. In both medicine and sports, we sometimes deploy a stress test to determine where the weakness might be in the oxygen transport system. This involves subjecting the body to escalating exercise while measuring aspects of the breath and the blood, as the lungs and heart kick into gear to keep pace.  For two years now, the body that is Canada has been unable to breathe freely, having been subjugated under various restrictions and vaccine requirements.

While many citizens considered these measures necessary for public safety, others began to question the legality of prolonged lockdowns and mandates. One strategy was to (literally) sit quietly and reduce “oxygen demand.” Those of the class who make a living via zoom calls could afford to sit it out, de-escalate. But the working class, many of whom require physical action to make a living, naturally resorted to the alternative strategy: they tried to breathe harder. Sometimes they expressed exasperation at not getting enough air. And all the while our youth have struggled to maintain mental acuity—the brain requires a lot of oxygen, the developing brain even more so.

A corporeal crisis was inevitable. Where was the blood pooling? Where were the choke points? What could be done to alleviate the problem? What is the message that must be sent to the metaphorical brain of the body Canada, to raise the alarm?

Unfortunately, like the fellow who flees to the basement during a heart attack to avoid embarrassment, our “brain” – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and ruling class – initially disregarded the severity of the signals. As the Freedom Convoy coursed through the national arteries en route to Ottawa, Trudeau dismissed it as a trivial clot - a “fringe group” with “unacceptable views.”

In a show of exceptionally poor judgement, just as the growing stress was rarely ameliorated over the last two years, little was done to alleviate the more visible stress over this past three-week period. No consultation. No debate. No reconciliation.

Improving oxygen flow was contemplated – and in some cases implemented – only at irregular intervals, and only by the provinces.

As the pooling and choking – especially at the borders – became “life threatening,” Trudeau finally emerged from hiding to deliver words that created yet more stress. For citizens who have felt that they have been held hostage for two years, Trudeau’s admonition that the government would no longer tolerate activists who “take the economy hostage” rang immensely hypocritical.

So now it is Valentine’s Day and Trudeau’s gift to Canada’s exploding heart is to invoke the Emergencies Act. He is making a bid to rush the body into a political coma, presumably so that remedial measures might be enacted to return Canada to functional equilibrium. As if functional equilibrium has been seen in Canada in recent memory.

The body Canada has not had freedom to breathe or speak for far too long already. The situation is long past critical, and a political coma cannot be the answer.

As an eyewitness to Canada’s unprecedented national seizure here in Edmonton, Alberta, it seems to me that Trudeau’s invocation of the Emergencies Act functions as a doubling-down. While offering bland words and imploring us to get over our nationwide hypoxia, he is effectively securing duct tape over our mouths and nostrils, when what we need is to be free, and to freely breathe.

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Linda Blade has a PhD in Kinesiology, is a sport performance professional, and can be found on twitter at @coachblade.

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