Someone Else's Queue

"We're just not doing this really well. Why is it that Canadians have to travel, or can travel, to the United States to get vaccinated? There's something fundamentally wrong with this."

"You can jump the queue. That's what this is all about. Instead of waiting here in Canada for God knows how long, I could go down to Florida and get vaccinated." 

Jeff Lerner, 65, Toronto resident 

"My biggest concern is not the plane or getting COVID on the plane, my worry is access to the hospital down there once you're there for the things that always went wrong and that's why you bought travel insurance -- broken hips, car accidents, stroke, heart attack."

"There has been an uptick no question, and every day is even more. [The slow pace of vaccine rollout in Canada has made a] very interesting alternative [for seniors]."

"I see people now going down because they're being influenced by their friends who have been down there since November, and this is the final incentive they needed to go down there and get the vaccine. To them, that's all that matters at this point."

"Imagine if you were down there and then for whatever reason an allergic [reaction] or something just didn't jibe, you end up God forbid in a hospital bed and it's linked to the fact that you had the vaccine, you could be out a lot of money."

Toronto-based travel insurance broker Martin Firestone

A healthcare worker with American Medical Response, Inc working with the Florida Department of Health in Broward administers a Pfizer-BioNtech COVID-19 vaccine at the John Knox Village Continuing Care Retirement Community on January 6, 2021 in Pompano Beach, Florida. Photo by Reuters

Florida has a population of 21.4 million people, and presumably that number swells with the influx of foreign visitors, all seeking the sun and sand beaches that Florida is famous for. Visits, particularly from the U.S.'s neighbour to the north are numerous, all the more so during the winter months, when senior citizens from Canada become 'snowbirds', regularly flocking to Florida to escape the cruel, long and cold Canadian winter. Many among them are the proud possessors of property in Florida, many more time-shares, and others are happy to enjoy the climate at rental units.

For many retired Canadians the annual southward journey is vastly preferable to remaining at home; a change of scenery, a change of environment, a life pick-me-up, among the communities of other Canadians. For Florida it's an annual cash infusion, welcoming the yearly migration. Last year, when the SARS-CoV-2 virus struck North America, Canadians abroad were urged by their government to hurry back home. Florida was in the throes of an infectious disease that had made less of a mark in Canada, and no one knew what further to anticipate.

As of January 6 during the second wave, Florida had its act together, was inoculating its population, giving out 323,000 doses, among them 114,000 people age 65 and over. Ontario's population in contrast is 14.5 million and the province has managed to administer 42,000 shots in the like time frame. The Government of Canada, while lauding itself for having placed on order far more vaccine doses than its population could conceivably use, has received thus far a rather inadequate number of doses, which it has doled out to the provinces taking into account their population numbers.

Unaccountably, the provinces appear to have thought better of hoarding the doses rather than immediately using all available to inoculate their most vulnerable demographics. And though fewer than a quarter of the large number of Canadians (900,000) who normally travel to spend the winter in Florida plan to this year, those who do anticipate they will be eligible to receive free vaccinations there, long before inoculations are due to be rolled out in Ontario. No one really knows when the serious rollouts will occur in Canada, transparency has become a little-used virtue of late, replaced by inertia and confusion.

According to recent media reports a number of elderly Canadians have travelled to their secondary residences in Florida, specifically for the purpose of being vaccinated. They are required to show identification but it appears a Canadian driver's license will do, oddly enough. Florida has targeted the elderly for inoculation and began their program a week ago. Many Canadians make in-advance appointments for their vaccinations, then travel to make the line-up, and plan to remain for the second shot, a matter of around three weeks

One man who was interviewed allowed as how he was "appalled and disappointed that I had to jump on an airplane to get vaccinated". According to Stephen Fine, president of online information hub Snowbird Adviser, half  of the almost one million Canadians who travel to secondary residences abroad go to Florida, the most popular destination, before Arizona and California. The rules relating to who can be vaccinated in any state or county are largely unknown as yet. There is a certain risk involved in boarding a plane without knowing whether one qualifies for vaccination as a non-resident.

Local policies, he points out, with respect to vaccine distribution has the potential to change with little advance notice. "Frankly", said one Canadian who had been vaccinated in Lee County, "I feel extremely safe here. I feel safer here than I do in Toronto." His Florida residence is located in a gated community about 200 km west of Miami. He flew to Florida on Tuesday, received the vaccine on Thursday and now isolates in his Bonita Springs community. 

"I was impressed by how organized they were", he said of his experience when he waited in line for about thirty minutes.  His second booster dose is scheduled for early February, and he plans to remain in Florida until April. His wife is soon to join him, and she too plans to be vaccinated as her husband has done.

Health care professionals administer the COVID-19 vaccine at Lake-Sumter State College in Leesburg, Fla., on Friday, Jan. 1, 2021. Canadian snowbirds are rushing to get inoculated against COVID-19 down south as provincial vaccine rollouts lag north of the border.    (Stephen M. Dowell /Orlando Sentinel via AP)

"We've had a huge demand. Over the past three weeks, it’s been a consistent flow of inquiries that we're trying to pair people up right now on flights… just to keep it even more safe within their travel bubble."

"This is not just people that are going to stay down in Florida, this is even people that were willing to go down with a couple of days to get the vaccine and then fly home again." 

Janelle Brind, vice-president, Momentum Jets chartered flights