COVID-19 vaccine mandates have worked in Canada — but they're harder to justify than ever

This is an excerpt from Second Opinion, a weekly health and medical science newsletter. If you haven’t subscribed yet, you can do that by clicking here.

COVID-19 vaccine mandates have worked extraordinarily well at getting more Canadians vaccinated, but they are increasingly hard to justify — not because of protests or political pressure — but because they’re a victim of their own success.

Vaccinations have been mandated for certain jobs, such as health-care workers and federal public servants, while vaccine passports have been put in place for non-essential services such as gyms, bars and restaurants for the general population. 

And they’ve been an