The Canadian province of Quebec will impose a “significant” tax on the unvaccinated.
Premier Francois Legault justified the move by stating that refusing vaccination — a decision made by 10% of Quebecers — leads to costs for the health care system. He said that the size of the penalty — which remains undecided — will be “significant.”
“Those who refuse to get their first doses in the coming weeks will have to pay a new health contribution,” Legault explained. “The majority are asking that there be consequences. … It’s a question of fairness for the 90% of the population that have made some sacrifices. We owe them.”
The announcement of the new tax caused a surge in new vaccinations, which Quebec Health Minister Christian Dubé called “encouraging” on Twitter.
Slightly over 12,000 people have passed away from COVID-19 in Quebec — a figure that represents a mere 0.14% of the province’s population.
However, fines and taxes for the unvaccinated are by no means unprecedented in the Western world. The Associated Press reported:
In Greece, people older than 60 have until Sunday to get their first coronavirus shots or be fined 100 euros ($113) for every month they remain unvaccinated.
Austria’s health minister announced last month the government plans to impose fines of up to 3,600 euros ($4,000) on people who flout a coronavirus vaccine mandate that it aims to introduce in February for all residents age 14 and over.
In Italy, residents 50 and older are required to be vaccinated, and beginning in mid-February those failing to do so will face fines as high as 1,600 euros ($1,800) if they enter their workplaces.
Meanwhile, news from the United States is more encouraging. The Supreme Court decided on Thursday to stay the Biden administration’s private employer COVID-19 vaccine-or-test mandate, which would have threatened 85 million workers.
“It’s a tremendous day for the American people and for the founding idea that this is a limited government of enumerated powers, which exists to protect, not erode, the God-given freedoms of the people,” Daily Wire Co-CEO Jeremy Boreing wrote in response to the decision. “What does all of that mean? It means we won. It means we’re still free.”
“It means the complainants, beginning with The Daily Wire, who brought the first in the nation lawsuit against the mandate, and the nearly 60 others, including the Federation of Independent Business and a coalition of states who were invited to give oral arguments before the court, have prevailed in our application for injunctive relief,” he continued. “And it means that, for today, and very likely forever, Joe Biden’s attempt to turn private employers into the enforcement arm of his federal vaccination scheme will not be implemented.”
“Total victory, not just for the millions of Americans who have exercised their right not to be vaccinated, but the millions more who oppose the tyranny of this mandate regardless of their vaccine status,” Boreing added. “And utter defeat for the government, which sought to enforce its will on the American people — literally INTO the American people — at threat of financial ruin just because they’re convinced they know better than you.”
“Drink their tears, my friends, and enjoy your freedom. By the grace of God, you still have it.”