Instilling Confidence?

Chief Public Health Officer Dr.Theresa Tam Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press

"It's preparing for -- something could happen to this virus, who knows? Something could change."           "We don't know the seasonality of this virus. It's continued throughout the summer, that's for sure, but what if it demonstrates a certain type of acceleration under certain conditions?"     "We are over-planning beyond what we had for the previous wave and  think that's the prudent thing to do."                             "This planning scenario is to get all of our partners up and down the health system to over-plan."                                                                                                                              Dr.Theresa Tam, Chief Public Health Officer, Canada

With fall approaching, federal health authorities anticipate an expected peak with a potential to temporarily exceed the coping capacity of the public health-care system, contemplating a surge of new cases of SARS-Cov-2 virus to erupt. Canada went into immediate lockdown back in March; five months on there has been a gradual, sequential re-opening of society inching toward normalcy. But this is still summer, where people tend to seek out-of-doors relief from sequestration.

With the arrival of fall, people will be moving indoors. Returning to office jobs to work in place, and with schools re-opening, students returning to a completely altered classroom with fewer students and distanced seating arrangements along with mandatory use of masks for the older elementary grades and beyond. With all this in mind, the federal government has been planning for a "reasonable worst-case scenario".

That sounds more ominous than it does 'reasonable', in the interests of prudence, but this is the reality of a situation where a new virus with frequent deadly outcomes able to spread like wildfire across the globe has altered life everywhere and uncertainty of the future and the changes in the virus itself and how those changes will impact those it infects will turn out. 

Federal health officials across the country are preparing for the potential of outbreaks capable of surpassing the greatest spikes the virus demonstrated it was capable of in March and April. That preparation and the possibility it portends taxes the imagination and defies preparations that are anticipated to be potentially inadequate to the task.

A certain amount of confidence should exist, given Canada's poor state of preparedness as the coronavirus roared into action back in March, with authorities stating that the country is in better shape with its preparations than it was back then. On the other hand, health experts are contemplating the planning it will take for the eventuality of concurrent outbreaks of seasonal influenza, and other respiratory illnesses, together with a newly rampant COVID-19.

The world is living in interesting times. The year 2020 will not readily be forgotten. The coming fall and winter may pose even greater problems in managing a trio of oncoming health threats. According to data released several days back, the number of cases that may erupt by August 23 could reach up to 127,740 with deaths coming in at a total of 9,115. "Peaks and valleys" of outbreaks may continue until January 2022; a possibility that is fearsome in and of itself.

To maintain the epidemic on a "slow burn", according to Dr.Tam, encouraging the population to continue following best public health practices while building up capacity within the health system speaks to the best possible strategy. This, while being aware of a need to swiftly ramp up response measures should case numbers spike.

The capacity to make certain people who are infected identified and quarantined as soon as possible is critical, as a measure to control and halt large outbreaks. Which feeds into the pilot launch of the COVID Alert app where two million people in Ontario alone, of a total provincial population of 14 million have downloaded the app to the present time.