Photos courtesy of Maclean’s article quoted
Once upon a time, long ago in the middle of the First Wave, Canada had one of the lowest records of COVID cases of all countries, and British Columbia had the best record for jurisdictions of its size in the world. And we were all pretty smug about that.
Jump to the middle (we hope) of the Third Wave, and British Columbia is right up there with Alberta and Ontario, Canada is down with Costa Rica and Puerto Rico at 600 deaths per million population, and our rate of vaccination is about half the success of Uruguay and the Dominican Republic. The United States, the former target of our sneers, has vaccinated ten times the rate of people we have.
A recent Maclean’s article pointed out that in those days we were flying by the seat of our pants, even the scientists. Now we have a year’s worth of data to make decisions on. Here are some possible areas of action.
Testing
In a situation so desperate that crossing one’s” t”s and dotting one’s “i”s are the only actions possible, the big “T” that didn’t get crossed in Canada and B. C. is testing. I remember back in the early days the many comments that data on new infections was unreliable because countries that were undeveloped or dishonest could keep their stats low by not testing. I seem to recall a certain American president spouting wisdom on that topic.
Well, the one action that many other countries have taken that Canada hasn’t is testing. So maybe our self-righteousness in the early days was misplaced. The only silver lining here is that possibly a whole lot of people had the disease and didn’t notice, so we may be closer to herd immunity than we think. A guy can dream.
Vaccine Production
There has been a lot of political hay baled about the holdups in deliveries, none of which makes any sense. Blaming the Liberals for the production problems at Moderna and the blood clots with A-Z doesn’t make much sense. The only pattern I can see is that somehow (surprise, surprise) countries like USA and Britain who have their own medical development facilities seem to have the jump on vaccinations. And there’s no doubt which “small-government” political party sold off Canada’s production capability to their industry friends.
Which brings us to:
Politics
It’s rather easy to point the finger at the two provinces with the worst COVID records and blame the industry-friendly policies of their right-wing governments. There’s no question that it’s true. As the statistics keep rolling in, we see that governments are shutting down high-profile sites like Main Street shops and restaurants, yet quietly allowing industrial facilities that are causing most of the spread right now to stay open.
However, it is notable that Quebec, which has a socialist-leaning government, and British Columbia, with the NDP in power, are not doing well right now either. Any ideas? Maybe Dr. Henry’s sweet reasonableness wasn’t tough enough. The Swedes would probably agree.
What to Do?
The Maclean’s article summarizes the data so far:
Surfaces are not a big problem. All the spraying we saw in earlier waves was pretty well useless. Wash your hands, but don’t go ape on disinfecting surfaces (except in places like stores and restaurants where people are breathing on surfaces in a closed environment)
Aerosolization is the main spreader. Wear a mask.
Meet Outside. Wind, distance, and sunlight are our friends
Close super-spreader events.
Indoor groupings are deadly. That includes mostly parties and factories.
In the long run, vaccines are the solution. Get your shot, no matter which one they offer.
The Bottom Line
More testing and aggressive contact tracing are necessary. As I mentioned in a recent article, if we don’t win this round, there’s a Fourth Wave coming on the wings of a worse mutation, and it could be the big hammer. We’re not out of the woods yet, folks,, and if we keep screwing around with half-measures, we’re in for more trouble.