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On April 30, 2021, the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO), an organization empowered by law to regulate the practice of medicine province-wide, made an official statement warning doctors not to speak out against any government COVID orders.
One wonders how it could possibly be in the public interest that, even in cases in which a medical practitioner is convinced that certain health rules are damaging, the doctor still "must not make comments or provide advice that encourages the public to act contrary to public health orders." Does this prohibition not violate every doctor's primary commitment to do no harm?
Clearly, there can be no genuine debate when doctors fear the loss of their livelihoods for dissenting from official policy. The forcing of medical unanimity will inevitably weaken public trust not only in health bodies like the colleges of physicians and surgeons, rightly judged to be exercising tyrannical power, but also in all aspects of a health-care system in which doctors cannot communicate openly and honestly with their patients.
It doesn't require a background in medicine to know that censorship of medical professionals during a pandemic is an outrageous and dangerous act.