Alberta Premier Danielle Smith shut down a CBC News reporter who asked if she would be receiving a Covid-19 booster vaccine this fall on Wednesday.
During a press conference on the ongoing E. coli outbreak in Calgary, Smith told CBC News reporter Aaron Collins that the media has no right to know her own personal medical decisions.
“The federal immunization panel is recommending that folks get their Covid booster this fall. Just curious if you have a sense of when that’s going to be available here in Alberta and if the province is going to be launching any kind of campaign to encourage people to do that and I guess, personally, if yourself were planning to get the shot?” asked Collins.
Premier Smith attempted to let Minister of Health Adriana LaGrange respond but Collins insisted on asking Smith if she would “get the shot.”
“Look I’m a healthy person, I tend to take care of my immune system and I believe this is something I should talk about with my doctor, not politics, not media,” said Smith.
According to LaGrange, Alberta is coordinating with the federal government to make the vaccines available in Alberta but it remains a personal decision for people to make.
“We just received information from the federal government in terms of when we will be seeing those vaccines available to the province. So we are working through the process,” said LaGrange.
“I’m very healthy as well, I have a very healthy immune system and you know what, I also believe that this is a personal decision for individuals to make. I will look at that as time progresses and what my journey is but again this is a personal decision. People have to make it for themselves, for their children and we respect the decisions that people make.”
Earlier this year, the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) put out guidance instructing Canadians to be up to date on their Covid-19 vaccinations.
“Booster doses in the fall will be formulations updated to target more recent, immune-evasive SARS-CoV-2 variants,” claimed NACI.
“Individuals vaccinated with the updated formulation are expected to benefit from a better immune response against these variants compared to current vaccines.”
