Canadian Masked Physician: ‘Normal’ Is ‘Far-Right Language’ of ‘Anti-Vaxxers’

Nili Kaplan-Myrth, a physician based in Ottawa, Ontario, framed the word “normal” as “far-right language” used by “anti-maskers” and “anti-vaxxers” during a panel discussion regarding COVID-19 on Tuesday’s edition of TVO’s The Agenda with Steve Paikin, during which she wore a mask while alone in a medical office.

Kaplan-Myrth describes herself as a “feminist” on her Twitter profile while listing the pronouns “she/her.”

Partial transcript below.

STEVE PAIKIN: It’s become clear that the message from the provincial government is “We’re all getting back to normal now, folks. So let’s start there, are we back to normally, yet?

NILI KAPLAN-MYRTH: No. So, the language that you use when you say something like “normal” is far-right language of anti-maskers, anti-vaxxers, and ableists who disregard the impact of COVID on seniors, on children, on educators, on essential workers, on healthcare workers, on our healthcare crisis.

There’s nothing normal about getting COVID, repeated infections, children and adults being hospitalized, and long COVID. There’s nothing normal about taking away the protections and the pro-active measures that we had to help to reduce the transmission of COVID.

STEVE PAIKIN: Okay. Let me do a quick follow with you – and I mean no disrespect in asking this – but we’ve obviously done hundreds of programs during the course of COVID-19, and I don’t think we’ve ever had a guest who kept their mask on during the interview. So again, without prejudice, I merely ask, how come you’re wearing yours now?

NILI KAPLAN-MYRTH: So let me explain. So I’m a doctor. I’m a family doctor. I see patients in my office. I just had patients who were in my office with their babies, and I have more patients coming in this afternoon. COVID is airborne. That means that COVID remains in the air even after you’ve left the room. 

I keep my mask on. It is a way to protect myself. It’s a way to protect my patients. It’s a way to protect my staff and the community. It is what healthcare providers across the world are saying that we should be doing, and it’s really not a hardship. I wear my mask from the moment that I arrived in my office in the morning until the end of the day. 

It’s a simple, safe, effective measure.

Kaplan-Myrth castigated Matt Strauss — another Canadian physician panelist on the program — of expressing positions “based in right-wing, anti-mask, anti-vax ideology.” She further derided him as a “minimizer” of COVID-19. 

Strauss critiqued “vaccine mandates,” “school closures,” and “lockdowns” as “cruel and coercive measures” imposed by government.

Kaplan-Myrth also derided those rejecting her guidance as “anti-science” and “anti-democracy” while spreading “misinformation.”