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Ziad 😷 Fazel 🇨🇦🇺🇦 Profile picture
@ZiadFazel
Jan 14, 2022 • 39 tweets • 23 min read • Read on X
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#COVID19AB Rapid Antigen Self-Test Approvals 🧵
Health Canada v Europe

Premier Kenney continues to gaslight anyone who will listen on this topic. Today he did it in response to @JuliaWongCBC question around the 47:20 mark of today's COVID theatre.

He worked up the outrage to claim:
• usual distortion & deflection about federal deliveries
• Health Canada has only approved 5-6
• European regulators have approved over 60
• He has been asking feds since April 2020 to approve more tests

So let's look at these claims...
Of the 103 tests Health Canada has approved:
• 37 Point-of-Care Rapid Tests*
• 10 Self-Test*
• 27 Antigen Tests

I don't see where he is getting 6 from.

* some of these are PCR or serum

canada.ca/en/health-cana… Image
Health Canada has already purchased 8 different tests, and distributed 124m to the provinces at no cost.

canada.ca/en/public-heal… Image
Alberta has received over 14m of these 3 tests alone from the federal government:
• BTNX approved Feb 2021
• Abbott Panbio approved Oct and Dec 2020
• BD Veritor approved Oct 2021

canada.ca/en/health-cana… ImageImageImage
The federal government has signed contracts for over 425m of 11 different tests.

At $2.99 billion in cost, that works out to $7.03 each.

How much is Kenney making us pay for 10m "emergency" tests?

"Emergency" but no delivery date for remaining 9m.

canada.ca/en/public-serv… Image
I knew the Premier was gaslighting to @gthomsonink.

Odd for a Premier to be so deep into these procurement details. It suggests political interference, maybe corruption.

He claimed over 60 in Europe "including many which are much more user friendly".

@gthomsonink So when I heard his complaint today about the feds not approving certain test(s) that have been approved in Europe..

(he didn't mention FDA so I figure they haven't approved them either)..

I suspected someone is trying to sell Kenney test(s) approved only in the EU.
Out of curiosity, I checked the other half of his gaslighting: European Approval.

Shocker!

Europe has decided not to approve rapid antigen self-tests.

So where is Kenney getting 60 from?

The number is Zero.

ec.europa.eu/health/sites/d… ImageImage
What does this mean to you?

"The EU common list of antigen tests does not include rapid antigen self-tests. It only includes those rapid antigen tests that are conducted by trained healthcare personnel or trained operators where appropriate.."

ec.europa.eu/health/sites/d… ImageImageImageImage
Having the feds purchase for the provinces gives volume pricing, and prevents provinces bidding against each other with our tax $$.

The feds already have Requests for Standing Offers, through non-partisan Public Services & Procurement Canada (PSPC).

canada.ca/en/public-serv… Image
Why would a supplier sell to Alberta, when they could sell to the feds? Maybe:
• Alberta is paying more
• Product is approved, but supplier is not reliable enough to be qualified
• like a broker who maybe got 1m, but now is on the spot market looking for 9m more at a profit.
Premier cracked me up when he sputtered about asking the feds since April 2020 to approve more rapid tests. @Dave_Khan and I have laughed about this.

Remember Alberta committing to Spartan Bioscience in April 2020 ahead of Health Canada approval?

"Turns out Health Canada was right to take its time testing Spartan’s technology last year. A new investor or owner, assuming one can be found, will now face even more skepticism."

You need both: approved product, and reliable supplier.

ottawacitizen.com/news/local-new…
Well, this was fun. We must do it again sometime, but I have to go to bed now.

Fact-checking the Gaslighter-in-Chief would take 24/7. I pick my spots.

But this has been going on for 2 weeks, and people are scared, being lied to and likely ripped off.

@threadreaderapp unroll
I’m just going to leave this here.
Well, lookie here.

AHS Board Meeting Minutes from 22 Dec 2021 reveal:
• up to $80m approved for COVID-19 rapid test kits
• from vendors **ALREADY ON** the Federal Government standing offer list for supply of Rapid Tests

This is colossally stupid.

albertahealthservices.ca/about/Page1394… ImageImageImageImage
You're welcome to hear the recording of the ~5-min teleconference if you wish, but:
• all discussion had already occurred out of public view
• all board members had already agreed
• the vote was just a formality
• taking under 3 min to perform

I did not know of this Board meeting when I wrote ⤵️, but it is WORSE than I thought.
• Alberta is NOT expanding the supply base beyond vendors ALREADY UNDER CONTRACT TO THE FEDS
• From the list of federally approved products the feds are not already supplying for free. Image
No, it is much more stupid - perhaps unethical- for Kenney to instead:
• use AB Taxpayer $$ to bid against the feds for earlier delivery
• of rapid test kits the feds are already using 🇨🇦 Tax $$ to buy
• which the feds already supply for free to all provinces incl Alberta. Image
Health Minister Copping is well aware of this Zero-Sum game. All he + Kenney are doing with this "Every Man for Himself" strategy is:
• jacking up market price for everyone
• wasting AB taxpayer $$
• screwing up fed plans to supply all 🇨🇦equitably.

In his thread, Minister Copping claims:

"Alberta’s government has directly procured nearly 14 million tests for the province."

Kenney is claiming 10m tests.

The reality is $80m worth, and the more Alberta jacks up the price trying to beat the feds, the fewer tests we'll get.
The feds are trying to nail down deliveries of 140m tests to distribute fairly (per capita, like vaccine) across Canada in January.

Instead of when provinces request, because, eg Alberta:
• did not plan to use them
• point fingers now
• interfere now

globalnews.ca/news/8489323/t…
So my unsolicited advice to Premier @jkenney and Health Min @JasonCoppingAB - as it was with Shandro & Vanch masks, IFR Chlorine Masks, & ABTraceTogether is:
• STFU
• Work with the feds
• Stop wasting AB Taxpayer $$ on cronies and inferior products.
@picardonhealth @Lorian_H @UbakaOgbogu @CTV_AvisFavaro @NatashaFatah
For those of you unfamiliar w Request for Standing Offers (RFSO), a streamlined method of procurement, vendors are dependent on the buyer to behave ethically w multiple standing offers.

IMO, Alberta is interfering with this market.

buyandsell.gc.ca/policy-and-gui…
When I built this thread a few days ago, the feds had 11 different products under contract:
• 425m tests at $7.03 each

As of 14 Jan 2022 update, feds have 16 products under contract:
• 433m tests at $6.93 each

This is the power of working TOGETHER.

canada.ca/en/public-serv… ImageImage
Feds transfer most $/capita for COVID-19 to AB:
• AB uses $80m to bid against Feds
• exclusively & explicitly from rapid test vendors under contract to Feds

@FilomenaTassi @jyduclos @cafreeland
@DuaneBratt @DavidMacCdn @trevortombe @andrew_leach

cbc.ca/news/canada/ca…
🤔This delivery schedule of 3m rapid tests/week seemed bogus when Kenney announced it.

Likely a fabrication to trick people into thinking Return to School on 10 January was safer than it is.

This global Demand>Supply problem didn't spring up overnight.

Image
Since @AHS_media is the prov organization tasked with ordering these $80m of rapid tests from fed suppliers...

..it falls on AHS to confirm this is the delivery schedule they first contracted with supplier(s), then provided the Premier so he could say "scheduled to arrive." ImageImage
On Thu 20 Jan, Premier Kenney's latest lies about rapid tests:
• "Health Dept" told him that US Gov did a "force majeure" 10 days ago on US Supplier under contract to AB
• ordered 1 billion tests from them and banned exports

(No evidence of this.)

And yet, despite this purported US hegemony, the Minister of that same "Health Dept" said they're still expecting:
• 3.5m rapid tests that week (last week)
• 4.5m this week

Wow. I guess the Global Supply/Demand situation isn't that bad after all.

You MAY have noticed we did not receive 3.5m (ANY) rapid tests last wk.

Unless Premier forgot to tell us about this while:
• he was ranting about US/Can vax mandate for cross-border truckers
• his staff were falsely depicting photos of empty shelves overseas as in Alberta
As you know, I only bother to fact-check Kenney when there are larger lessons to be learned, or clear implications of what he is really doing behind the gaslighting.

So let's look at the US rapid test approval & procurement, then compare to Canada, eh?

whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/…
Per White House 14 Jan, USA (pop 332m)
• using Defence Production Act and big $$$ to stimulate production since Feb 2021
• 9 rapid tests approved
• 420m tests under contract

Per Gov of Canada 14 Jan (pop 38m)
• over 50 rapid tests approved
• over 433m tests under Contract ImageImageImageImage
Look again at this colossally stupid decision to restrict AHS only to suppliers already under contract to Feds, so AHS is stuck bidding against Feds.

Why not allow AHS to buy any of the over 50 rapid tests approved by Health Canada?

Are Kenney & Copping setting up AHS to fail? ImageImageImageImage
Rapid Antigen Tests + Medical Masks = GoA plan for safe return to school, and to contain Omicron. But:
• Tying AHS hands = GoA wants Albertans to experience GBD, not RAT.
• Sending kids BYD Non-Medical garbage instead of Medical Masks?

Unconscionable.

If I'm a supplier to the feds, w 10m RATs still avail from January production allocation, who am I selling to:
• Gov of Can w $3b budget for 433m tests at $7 ea?
• GoA w 80m budget, who claim they bought 14m at $5.72 each, and have been lying all month about why they're late?
Now I'm really curious about the first 1m rapid tests Alberta was able to directly procure.

Kenney's desperation allows an intermediary or broker to mark it up big, and book a tidy profit by year-end.

Who were those 1m tests purchased from?
What was the price?
Sole-sourced?

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More from @ZiadFazel

Ziad 😷 Fazel 🇨🇦🇺🇦 Profile picture
Jun 7
I was going to tweet about my early dinner tonight at Palomino (cliché food pics) but just got hit with wall of SWEET sound when I went downstairs to use the washroom, and opened the steel door to basement concert hall.

WOW.

This is "Olde Ghosts" warming up - in this program. My photo with permission of Olde Ghosts 4-piece band warming up (I'd say they're already on fire) as I went to basement washroom at Palomino (shared with underground concert hall).
In the program they are listed as "Old Ghost" which may just be a miscommunication between Palomino mgmt and Band mgmt. Still gets the message across.
I am a nerdy 58-yr-old engineer who surprises people with 2 unexpected traits: a love for good metal, and endless jokes.

On the latter, I am like Leslie Nielsen who could easily get even people braced for his hidden fart accordion to crack up. But I'm not using one....yet.👺
With metal, I was raised with Indian music my parents played, like the Pakeezah soundtrack, until the cassette literally broke.

This is one of the songs from that movie. It builds until Meena Kumari (Indian's Marilyn) dances with those 2 😍 backups.

Read 9 tweets
Ziad 😷 Fazel 🇨🇦🇺🇦 Profile picture
May 30
Kinda proud of myself. Also.. life is hilarious.

I’ve been eating a lot of rich, flavourful food recently, and I went from a salmon/capers omelet at OEB to the passcode protected washroom in food court at Fifth Avenue Place. Took a massive, relaxed dump.

Laughing as I type.
So I’m washing my hands - even had the foresight to take a restaurant napkin to dry my hands and use on the door lever to exit (trust me on this) and a distinguished gentlemen t about 60 walks in.

And visibly buckles, and groans.

I’m trying not to laugh out loud.
I step out of washroom and all of this is hitting me as I walk slowly to exit escalator, down to a bench on 5 Ave, where I am typing this now.

I’m almost crying not to burst out laughing.

And the Punjabi woman security guard sweetly asks me “Are you OK?”

No, Bhenji. I’m not.
Read 4 tweets
Ziad 😷 Fazel 🇨🇦🇺🇦 Profile picture
May 25
This @NewsHour story too new to have transcript as well as published video interview with Dr @jasonmnagata but here's his website for his research:

ucsfbenioffchildrens.org/providers/dr-j…

@tylerblack32 @TheBreakdownAB @KmarkovCTV @picardonhealth @JenLeeCBC @MurrayManera @JSJamato @gabefabreau x.com/NewsHour/statu…
Didn't have room for @TehseenLadha @orlaghokelly @John1MD @dupuisj @vettergreenart
@TehseenLadha @orlaghokelly @John1MD @dupuisj @vettergreenart @threadreaderapp unroll please

The transcript is up now at:



@tylerblack32 @TheBreakdownAB @KmarkovCTV @picardonhealth @JenLeeCBC @MurrayManera @JSJamato @gabefabreau @drDavidKeegan @amandalhu @CalgarysChild @MarciaOnTheGo pbs.org/newshour/show/…Ali Rogin: Dr. Nagata, thank you so much for joining us. Social media children, lots of questions, few answers. What did your study find? Jason Nagata: We followed 12,000 preteens over three years and we actually found big rises in social media use. So during that period, social media on average increased from seven minutes a day to over 70 minutes a day. So a tenfold increase. And in our analysis, we actually found that rises in social media from year to year among these 9 then 10 then 11-year olds were actually associated with future depressive symptoms in the following year. So I thin...
Ali Rogin: So what you're saying is that you found the correlation here to be with social media use leading to more depressive symptoms, not the other way around. You're saying that depression doesn't necessarily indicate use of social media? Jason Nagata: Yes. In our study, were able to follow these same 12,000 kids year to year. So were able to look at both their depression and their social media use every single year. And so we could look at patterns in their use. And we found that those kids who had big spikes in their social media use from year to year then subsequently had bigger sp...
Ali Rogin: And talk to us about the size and the scope of this study. This sounds massive. How did you track this many children and has that been done before? Jason Nagata: So, yeah, the data comes from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study. It is a national study that follows these 12,000 kids from over 21 different states, study sites across the U.S. and it's funded by the National Institutes of Health and is I think one of the largest studies on child development and social media and brain health ever.
Ali Rogin: That's such a fascinating ancillary piece of information that you found in looking at this data. I do want to ask though, what is your advice for parents with the understanding that this data brings us to. Jason Nagata: Yeah, we actually looked at parent actions for rules and monitoring in the study and we actually found that the biggest predictors of kids screen use was actually their parents screen use. And as a new parent I think it's really important to practice what you preach. So if you're going to tell your kids to put down their phones to important that you role model g...
Read 4 tweets
Ziad 😷 Fazel 🇨🇦🇺🇦 Profile picture
May 8
🧵 Alberta's Reigning Queen of deceptive cherry-picked public health stats, Health Min LaGrange, was back at it Monday, this time over measles immunization.

Bonus Topic: Where is the source for the widespread claim that airborne measles is only infectious up to two (2) hours? Screenshot from Goa 5 May 2025 press release, where Health Min LaGrange made the same claim in the YouTube press conference: [below is the quote verbatim, but I would put sarcastic quotes around "facts"] "Quick facts • Currently, appointments in the central zone are available within one day, while in the south zone appointments are available usually within one to two days. • Following increased efforts to educate Albertans on measles and the importance of immunization, there has been a significant rise in immunizations across the province. Since March 16, there has been a 67...
Excerpt from GoA lengthy web page on measles "How measles spreads Measles is an extremely contagious disease, spread easily through the air. You do not need to be in direct contact with someone who is infected. You can get measles just by passing through a room or location where a person who is infected was up to 2 hours before. The person who is infected does not still need to be there to put you at risk of disease. Measles can also be spread through coughing, sneezing, yelling, singing and breathing."
@TheBreakdownAB @JMeddings @PfParks @LukaszukAB @JenLeeCBC @GosiaGasperoPhD @Mark_Ungrin @dupuisj @DrFiliatrault @TimmCTV Let me provide the links for the above two graphics:

• cherry-picked measles immunization stats

alberta.ca/release.cfm?xI…

• purported 2-hour limit on infectious airborne measles

alberta.ca/measles
@TheBreakdownAB @JMeddings @PfParks @LukaszukAB @JenLeeCBC @GosiaGasperoPhD @Mark_Ungrin @dupuisj @DrFiliatrault @TimmCTV On the deceptive, cherry-picked measles immunization stats, LaGrange said "Since March 16, there has been a 67% increase in comparison to last year."

Let's look at actual graphs & data tables.

alberta.ca/measles#jumpli… "Figure 2a. Measles containing immunization doses administered by week and geography, 2023-2025 for Alberta" showing the 2025 line does not cross over 2023 and 2024 lines until 16 March 2025. Prior to that, 2025 was well below both 2024 and 2023.
Closeup of graph, showing the yellow 2025 line does not cross over black 2023 and red 2024 lines until 16 March 2025. Prior to that, 2025 was well below both 2024 and 2023.
Closeup of graph, highlighting the yellow 2025 line to show better that it does not cross over black 2023 and red 2024 lines until 16 March 2025. Prior to that, 2025 was well below both 2024 and 2023.
Data table for GoA's graph, showing the actual numbers of measles immunization shots per week in those 3 years.
Read 42 tweets
Ziad 😷 Fazel 🇨🇦🇺🇦 Profile picture
Apr 24
I was just treated TERRIBLY by @HyattCalgary. Manager just denied me service in restaurant for some vague reasons behind:

“None of the staff are comfortable with you and want to serve you.”

Huh? You just lost polite, loyal 20% tip customer. Maybe my friends too.

See you never.
The VP who oversees the restaurant was not on, but I left my business card.

My @Hyatt loyalty card, which shows zero as it has not updated for my purchases since February, when my car died, and I found walking there convenient. High prices, but matching food & service (!) Image
@Hyatt Now, I don’t care about my points, as I will never visit @HyattCalgary again, for any reason.

I won’t spend much time with the VP if he or she calls me. This is their problem to solve, not mine. I’ll get nothing from it either way - I’m gone.
Read 4 tweets
Ziad 😷 Fazel 🇨🇦🇺🇦 Profile picture
Apr 22
Dear @CalgaryPolice and other smart people. I'm looking for 2 things:
• video of press conference and written response by Chief @neufeld_mark to Dreeshen's stupid announcement early Dec 2024
• GoA policy & evidence to get sites approved for photo radar

calgary.ca/cps/traffic/ph… x.com/DevinDVote/sta…
@CalgaryPolice @neufeld_mark I didn't know until now of this formal 12-month pilot while looking for more information related to my witnessing a cop nearly killed on Centre Street @ Samis Road on Sat night by a speeder who pulled over, then zoomed away.

@reportrix @MBellefontaine

cbc.ca/news/canada/ca…
@CalgaryPolice @neufeld_mark @reportrix @MBellefontaine I always knew Dreeshen's announcement, served in a "No Cash Cow" BBQ apron with Beef on a Bun for reporters, was colossally stupid.

I learned it kicked in on 1 April.

Will talk on record about my direct personal experience from this Saturday night.

Read 4 tweets

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