Adam Prudhomme
Editor
Early numbers show Ontario’s fourth wave of COVID-19 is trending the way healthcare officials had hoped.
Speaking with local media on Wednesday, KFLA Public Health’s Acting Medical Officer of Health Dr. Hugh Guan noted the early data is encouraging both across the province and locally. As of Wednesday the provincial seven-day average for new cases was 717.
“That is actually pretty good news in the sense of our seven day average of cases has stabilized,” said Guan. “I believe if you match the seven-day case average with the Ontario Science Table modeling, we’re kind of trending in the more sort of best case scenario rather than the worst case scenario. So that is a bit of a silver lining.”
Hospitalizations were at 363 across the province, 162 of those were in the ICU. As of Wednesday morning KFLA had 46 active COVID-19 cases, none of which required a stay in a hospital. Though the number of hospitalizations across Ontario was creeping up, Guan says they did appear to be leveling off, which was a good sign.
“We’ll need to monitor for longer for a few weeks as schools are back in but this is more along the lines of a good case scenario than the worst case scenario,” he added.
The numbers were especially good among the elderly, those who are considered most at risk if they were to contract COVID-19. Very few long-term care homes in Ontario had reported any cases or outbreaks.
“We definitely do not have any LTC outbreaks locally, but across Ontario the vaccinations really are working in terms of we aren’t seeing massive long-term care outbreaks like we were last year around this time,” said Guan.
KFLA’s 46 cases represent a rate of 14 cases per 100,000 people and an average of about four new cases per 100,000 per week. Under the provincial’s old colour-coded rating system, KFLA would fall under yellow.
“Cautious. That would be the word of the day,” said Guan.
On the vaccination front, KFLA’s numbers continue to climb.
“In terms of vaccinations we continue to creep up slowly, but surely,” said Guan. “We at 85.7 per cent first dose coverage for those 12 and over and 79.6 per cent second dose coverage for those 12 and over. Over the last seven days the average number of doses given has been rising. I believe that prior to some of the vaccine policy announcements (Ontario government announcing proof of vaccine would be required for certain businesses starting Sept. 22) we were averaging around 300 to 400 doses a day. After (the announcement) we’re now at 600 to 700ish doses a day. A good proportion of these are first doses so that is also positive news in that vaccine policy announcements have encouraged people who were a little more on the fence to get the vaccine.”
Guan says the province has also expanded its third dose eligibility to include people who are on medicines that suppress an immune system. Locally the region has given out ‘a couple hundred’ third doses, mostly to those in a long-term care setting or cancer patients.
“I would just like to thank everyone in the community for getting vaccinated, it’s really the best thing we can do to protect ourselves, our family and the overall community,” said Guan. “For those who have not been vaccinated, please do get vaccinated. As we’re seeing right now, they’re working. They’re safe and effective. They’ve very much quite effective in terms of minimizing severe illness if you do get COVID as well as preventing COVID. Provincially we continue to see that whereby the folks who are in ICU there is a 25 to 50 times rate or chance of being unvaccinated compared to vaccinated, which means there’s now a 25 to 50 times chance of protection against severe illness.”
Since Sept. 4 the region has seen 11 cases in kids under the age of 17 as well as 24 cases in those 18 to 29.
Guan says though the cases have been in school aged children, they aren’t being contracted in a school setting.
“We haven’t declared any school outbreaks,” said Guan. “They are very much all from family transmission or social gatherings. We have not seen within school transmission and therefore do not have any school outbreaks.”
Guan says the local health unit is currently tracking over 300 contacts of positive cases and recommends lowering social contact to help flatten the curve.
For now it would appear there’s little risk of schools returning to virtual learning.
“Locally I would say it’s a very low chance in the sense that our cases have all been either stable or in certain segments of the population,” said Guan. “We have never seen wide spread transmission in our schools compared to stories you may have heard or instances you may have heard in other jurisdictions. Especially this year with a combination of vaccinations and experience with the school settings I believe that the measures are stronger. I believe vaccinations are going to help a lot in terms of protecting whole segments of our school population. I would very much hope that schools are not closed this year because we know that being in school is very much beneficial to children’s mental, physical as well as social wellbeing and we want to keep kids in school for as long as possible.”