It’s official. The COVID-19 pandemic is three years old.
The WHO made its declaration on March 11, 2020, after 118,000 cases in 114 countries and 4,291 deaths.
Here at home, there have been 57,127 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 730 deaths in Simcoe Muskoka since COVID-19 was first identified in Canada. The death toll worldwide is nearing 7 million.
Most people have resumed their normal lives, thanks to a wall of immunity built from infections and vaccines, but experts urge caution.
“On a whole, I think it’s a good thing, but because of that I think they’re losing opportunities to decrease the impact further,” said Dr. Charles Gardner, Medical Officer of Health for Simcoe Muskoka.
Reflecting on the past three years, Dr. Gardner says hindsight is 20/20.
“Indeed this has been one of the worst pandemics of the century. It had a severe impact,” he said. “When I look back, there were indicators that it could be a long time. It was hard for people to take in.”
To date:
- There have been 91 new cases reported to the health unit for the current week. There were 216 new cases reported to the health unit last week (week of February 26th), 30% higher than the 166 cases reported for the week of February 19th.
- There were 30 deaths reported in January, 20 deaths in February, and one so far in March.
- To date, 6,225 cases have tested positive for the Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant of concern, and an additional 2,706 cases are considered suspect Omicron (awaiting confirmatory testing).
- In total 1,540,772 doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in Simcoe Muskoka, including 132,940 bivalent doses administered since September 12, 2022. 124,422 (22.3%) individuals 12 years of age and older living in Simcoe Muskoka have received a booster dose of vaccine in the previous six months.
Dr. Gardner said the pandemic, in many ways, has quite profoundly changed the lives of many.
“For one, there were a number of impacts on our well-being,” he said. “Mental well-being, children’s education and technical changes in the work environment.”
He also recognizes that some communities were hit harder during the pandemic than others.
“We know populations with lower incomes and racialized communities were impacted to a significantly greater degree.”
A report released last week by Ontario’s Chief Medical Officer of Health sheds light on what would have happened without public health measures. It states that as devastating as COVID-19 was in Ontario and Canada, without public health measures such as closures, travel restrictions, contact tracing and masking, the situation could have been much worse.
It estimates deaths would have been 20 times higher and hospitalizations 13 times higher.
The report goes on to say that although the health system is dealing with capacity and health human resources issues, “Ontario is more ready now than we were when the COVID-19 pandemic started in 2020.”
There is no specific checklist that Ontario can use to guarantee it will be ready for the next outbreak or pandemic. However, the Office of the Chief Medical Officer of Health says it will “adapt existing frameworks and indicators for pandemic preparedness to regularly assess and report on the public health sector’s progress in sustaining, strengthening, and developing its capacity to be ready for the next outbreak or pandemic.”
Locally, Dr. Gardner says the virus has been in somewhat of a stable state since June, 2022, but with COVID-19 still very much with us, getting vaccinated is important.
“Keeping up to date,” he said. “I think it’s something we’ll keep having to do, much like we do with the flu.”
Even if a person is fully immunized, Dr. Gardner says there is still a risk of contracting the virus. Along with getting vaccinated he suggests wearing a mask indoors when possible, continuing to self-monitor symptoms and follow public health advice because there is an opportunity to reduce that threat.
“The price is too high to let preparedness go.”
More information on COVID-19 in Simcoe Muskoka can be found here. And the report by Ontario’s Chief Medical Officer of Health here.
