During the COVID-19 pandemic, Montagnier was a promoter of the conspiracy theory that SARS-CoV-2, the causative virus, was deliberately created in, and thereafter escaped from a laboratory. Such a claim has been refuted by other virologists.
"David Naylor, a physician and former University of Toronto president who led a federal review into Canada’s response to the 2003 SARS epidemic, said hospital capacity probably plays a bigger role in Canadian decision-making than in the U.S. because Canada’s universal system means “the welfare of the entire population is affected if health care capacity is destabilized.”
But he also argued that focusing only on hospital capacity could be misleading. “Both Canada and the U.S. have lower capacity than many European countries,” he wrote by email.
The major difference between the two countries’ responses to Covid outbreaks is cultural, Naylor argues. In Canada, more than the U.S., policy is guided by a “collectivist ethos” that tolerates prolonged shutdowns and other public health restrictions to keep hospitals from collapsing." -article