With the Omicron variant set to become Ontario’s dominant COVID-19 strain, experts want the province to explain how it plans to alter its response to the pandemic if many people are infected much faster than during waves previous ones.
“We’ve obviously been doing this for two years, but it’s very different,” said Dr. Zain Chagla, an infectious disease specialist at McMaster University.
“We’re going to see something that I don’t think I’ve seen before.”
Ontario announced two weeks ago that it had detected the first two cases of Omicron in Canada. Since then, the variant has come to account for around 11% of infections, according to the province’s Pandemic Expert Advisory Group, and has started to spread in local communities.
The province’s top doctor has said he expects Omicron to become dominant within weeks. The evolution comes in the midweek of a steadily rising disease curve, with 1,476 cases reported Sunday and a seven-day average of 1,236 daily infections, up from 926 a week ago.
Scientists are still probing the exact characteristics of Omicron. But based on trends seen in Omicron-dominant regions like South Africa, Chagla said Ontario must determine how it will respond if up to 10,000 people are infected each day.
This scenario would strain the current public health approach of tracing and testing contacts of all infected people, he said, meaning resources should be prioritized.
“The way we handled COVID in March 2020 will have to be different when we see such high transmission rates in our community. I think these discussions need to take place now,” Chagla said.
With so much potential spread, he said it was also possible that entire swathes of health workers would be forced to self-isolate immediately, putting essential services at risk. The province should determine how to avoid this situation, Chagla said.
“As the holidays approach, all of us – healthcare and others – want advice on how to handle this so that we don’t jam up and shut down services when people need them most. “
Niagara region’s top public health doctor said his health unit was discussing contingency plans – although he said the apparent speed of Omicron’s spread made it impossible to prepare for or fight the outbreak. expected growth of cases with measures such as blockages.
“The game has completely changed here,” Dr Mustafa Hirji said in an interview. “We’re not going to have the capacity to really do everything.”
Hirji said he expects the contact tracing capacity to be overwhelmed within a week or two. The testing capacity may last a little longer, but he said compromises will likely have to be considered eventually if health workers performing testing might be needed to give booster shots or treat sick people.
Health units will have to make decisions on how to prioritize limited resources, he said. And without a provincial leadership, the 34 public health units will have plans based on their own risk judgments, which will lead to a patchwork system that Hirji says “will be very confusing to the public and likely not engender trust”.
“A clear articulation of what the priority is for the future, what are we willing to go without in a compromise, and where are we going to make sure we are pushing our resources towards. I think it would be very good to ‘obtain consistency on this point across the province,’ he said.
University of Toronto epidemiologist Dr Jeff Kwong said Omicron is hitting Canada at the worst possible time, as health workers grapple with residents exhausted and fatigued by the pandemic, subjected to relatively fewer public health restrictions, prepare for holiday gatherings.
“I think it’s going to spread very quickly in Ontario,” Kwong said. “It’s going to be tough in a month or two.”
The potential for rapid spread is of concern for high-risk residents, Kwong said, as the province’s recall plan was based on the Delta variant being the dominant COVID-19 strain, and those most in need of boosters may be exposed to Omicron before they get third doses.
He said it wasn’t possible to get a third injection for everyone before Omicron took it up a notch, but the priority in the coming weeks should go to creative solutions to quickly vaccinate agents. vulnerable and frontline health care providers.
People aged 50 and over will be able to reserve third doses from Monday. Others, including people 70 and older, Indigenous adults, frontline healthcare workers, long-term care residents, and people with certain health conditions are currently eligible for recalls, and the province said it plans to open third-dose bookings to all adults in the New Years.
Getting a booster as soon as he’s eligible is one way for individuals to mitigate the risk of COVID, Kwong said, while minimizing social gatherings indoors and prioritizing good ventilation. He said tighter capacity rules and tighter enforcement of mask policies could also help the government.
Chagla said preparations for Omicron’s major spread should take place regardless of other political decisions.
“It’s going to spread through our population one way or another,” he said. “We just need to prepare.”
A spokesperson for the Ministry of Health said Ontario was “prepared and ready to respond to the Omicron variant”, with plans to make testing more widely available and to hire more staff for hospitals and hospital management. case.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published on December 12, 2021.
“Coffeeaholic. Lifelong alcohol fanatic. Typical travel expert. Prone to fits of apathy. Internet trailblazer.”