Environment passes COVID as top concern among Canadians: Poll

A new poll discovered the environment eclipsed the ongoing pandemic as Canadians' number one concern since the pandemic's onset in March 2020. According to CTV News, a new poll from Nanos Research found the environment ranks as the top issue of national concern among 17.1 percent of respondents.

"This week in the Nanos tracking coronavirus was not, I repeat, not the top national issue of concern," said Nik Nanos, founder and chief data scientist at Nanos Research, on CTV's Trend Line podcast. "It was the environment as what Canadians are worried about, and the environment has been on the upswing in the last number of weeks, with concern about coronavirus on the downswing," he added.

Following the environment, 14.9 percent of respondents labelled COVID as their top national issue. In comparison, 11.9 percent said healthcare was their top concern, 11.1 percent said the economy and 4.7 percent said the federal deficit.

"I think a lot of this has to do with not necessarily the environment being more important, but the coronavirus," said Nanos. "People [are] feeling a little more comfortable, a little more normalization of people's lives. The kids are back to school. People are thinking about going back to work and, as a result, less concern about the coronavirus."

Before the pandemic began, the environment ranked as the top national concern with 20.5 percent of respondents, followed by 15.4 percent saying jobs, 12.3 percent saying healthcare, and 4.9 percent saying the federal deficit.