Canada: calls for futher action against COVID misinformation
Experts in Canada are calling for more and stricter actions against healthcare professionals who spread COVID misinformation or disinformation. Ontario's Health minister has noted the "extremely concerning" situation and urged the colleges to crack down. A professor in the Department of Politics at Ryerson University has said, "[We need] the government of Ontario to put in place an accountability framework that’s meaningful, substantial and that’s transparent for the various self-regulating professions in this province." A bioethicist at the University of Toronto has indicated that the argument in favor of freedom of speech "is not relevant" in this context: “There’s a difference between freedom of speech as a citizen and freedom of speech as a profession. Physicians have absolutely a highly elevated ethical responsibility to the community, and the very nature of medicine itself is the platform is evidence-based science and research.”