Theresa Tam hides from investigation into propaganda-laden COVID Christmas videos

Chief Public Health Officer Theresa Tam has been putting out cringeworthy COVID-19 propaganda videos since 2020 that centred around exploiting Christmas to ensure Canadian children and their parents complied with public health directives.

When Rebel News initially inquired about costs, after the third video was published in December 2022, the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) said that “the video in question was produced in-house and therefore there were no associated costs concerning the production, development and distribution of this video.”

Yet newly released government documents – 369 pages to be exact – detail a lot of paid staff time to bureaucrats tasked with determining if Christmas trees were offensive and ridiculous script-finessing blunderings for a two-minute pet project.

Taxpayer-funded bureaucrats went back and forth on the script, video edits, background images and lines rehearsed. They spent time arguing over how to translate “ommmmm” and how and if to make multiple versions of the video, not just in our two official languages, French and English, but longer and shorter versions fit for sharing on various social media platforms.

On November 21, 2022, Sean Upton, manager of Video Services at Health Canada, wrote that “the set up for the exchange between [Tam] and Santa took a lot of prep work and a lot of post-production work.”

The documents confirm that the editorial direction from the videos were meant to “leverage holiday traditions to reinforce public health messaging” and was geared toward parents and caregivers of children aged 10 and under, including children's hospitals and healthcare networks.

There is a suggestion questioning whether Mrs. Claus should be the one giving health advice, as opposed to Tam.

Consideration is given to the potential appeal of holiday-patterned masks for children, which is later contradicted as a bureaucrat named "Cathy L" is tasked with investigating whether “holiday pattern masks are [Health Canada] authorized products.”

Producers wonder if it would be "more empowering" to have Mrs. Claus giving the health advice and they strive to include that she works on the sleigh, to promote STEM to girls.

Video approvals include Director of Strategic Communications Christina Lawand – a former CBC reporter found by the CBC Ombudsman to be selectively editing former Prime Minister Stephen Harper clips in 2006.

At least she has lots of video editing experience!

The documents show that Nancy Hughes, communications and speechwriter, as well as deputy head and ministerial internal engagement with Health Canada and PHAC, played Mrs. Claus.

Upton emails Hughes to inform her that the recording would take up a “good part of the day… roughly 10 am to 4 pm.”

Hughes expresses delight at this “little project,” saying it would be a “hoot” and was “happy for a nice little break from the ordinary.”

Then, Lawand becomes confused as to why Christmas trees are banned.

"I don't understand about the 'no evident Christmas tree,'" she says. “I was okay with removing the word Christmas but I don't see why this should extend to not showing a tree – as these are absolutely everywhere and non-controversial, even for non-Christians.”

Tam becomes very concerned about how her title is shown on screen and wants it to be possessive, requesting "Canada's Chief” as opposed to Chief Public Health Officer of Canada.

Lawand further worries that Santa might have said "Uhm" instead of "Ohmm,” which she thinks implies Santa doesn't want to talk to Tam.

“Says Uhm instead of Ohm,” the email states. “As Leslie suggests, this may signal that Santa is trying to get out of talking to the Dr. vs. yoga!"

The bureaucracy concludes that so few people watched Tam's previous Christmas video that they aren't even going to bother creating a described video version – “given that the performance analytics were low last year, a described video version is not required.”

This absurd misuse of taxpayer funds makes it clear that the agency entrusted with safeguarding public health will shamelessly divert resources to propagandize Canadian children.

As reported by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, the “average annual compensation for a full-time federal bureaucrat is $125,300” according to the Parliamentary Budget Officer.

If that works out to roughly $500 per day, with at least 10 different bureaucrats partaking in this “fun” and cheerful child propaganda video, that’s at least $5,000 in salaries for just the one day of filming.

And despite the PHAC developing a “regulatory openness and transparency framework,” they’re trying to hide how much this in-house pet project truly costs the taxpayer.

Interestingly, this past Christmas, in 2023, the agency opted not to put out a child-geared propaganda-laden vaccine-pushing video exploiting Christmas, even though they had been doing so since 2020.

In 2020, Tam declared Santa an “essential worker” and cleared him to work on Christmas Eve.

In 2021, Tam cleared Santa for take-off with his layered protection – masked and boosted of course – and discriminated against poor Rudolph because of his red nose by forcing him to take a COVID test.

In 2022, Tam had a video call with Mrs. Claus for a “holiday health check” where Santa’s notorious nice list is propagandized to push vaccine marketing on Canadian children and their parents.

Read the documents:

Tamara Ugolini

Senior Editor

Tamara Ugolini is an informed choice advocate turned journalist whose journey into motherhood sparked her passion for parental rights and the importance of true informed consent. She critically examines the shortcomings of "Big Policy" and its impact on individuals, while challenging mainstream narratives to empower others in their decision-making.

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