COVID-19 Cases Surging in Ontario
Earlier in March, Ontario’s government decided to remove all capacity restrictions, vaccine passport mandates, and masking mandates in the province. The government cited several factors in their decision including Ontario’s high vaccination rate, the availability of antiviral treatments, a stable test positivity rate, and a decline in hospitalizations. Now, as April begins, it seems as though a lot of those factors have reversed. The test positivity rate hit 17.9%, a mark not seen since late January, and due to the fact that the province still has not been able to improve their testing capacity, this figure, along with the reported number of cases, are still believed to be underrepresenting the true testing and case numbers in the province.
Hospitalizations have been trending upwards over the last few weeks as case counts have begun to rise and this has only become more apparent over the last few days with the province reporting an increase of about 150 hospitalizations since last Friday. Wastewater indicators have also begun to show an increase in levels of COVID-19 which has been reported as early as a week ago and as recently as two days ago (sorry for the paywall). The vaccination rate has also stagnated with only 51% of eligible recipients receiving a booster dose which has proven to be very effective at preventing severe outcomes. While the two-dose series has also proven to be somewhat effective at preventing severe outcomes, its effectiveness is less than when supplemented with a single booster shot, and neither the two-dose series nor the three-dose series has proven to be robustly effective at preventing transmission in the face of Omicron or the BA.2 subvariant which is now expected to become the dominant strain thanks to its even-more-potent transmissibility.
The Premier and Minister of Health have both said that the province is better equipped to handle any increase in hospitalizations with the Premier citing the province’s ability to use 3,000 more ICU beds and Minister Elliott citing the province’s Plan to Stay Open that includes allocating money to attract nurses to underserved areas. There is no mention of actually hiring more nurses to be able to staff those ICU beds aside from the $5,000 payment that is being offered to nurses in two instalments. The provincial opposition parties have called on the government to reveal how they plan to cope with the surge in cases and the growing number of hospitalizations but so far, the answer has been that we’re staying the course. The government has said that they are monitoring the situations in long-term care homes and plan to extend the free rapid test program until July while facing pressure to expand access to PCR testing. The government has stated that they have no plans to reintroduce a provincial masking mandate even as some regional officials have begun to push people to wear their masks. While this wave may have been inevitable and may not be a direct result of the loosening restrictions as some might say, it is clear that the lack of protections at the provincial level have contributed to its growth and has not left us as prepared to handle it as we should be.
With the June election looming, it’s clear that the Premier is making decisions that will hopefully lead to his re-election and not ones that made him one of the most cautious leaders in North America and Ontario’s response to COVID continues to be a gamble. While this wave is not projected to be as devastating as previous ones, it’s hard to make peace with any increase in hospitalizations considering we’re doing nothing to actively prevent them besides hoping vaccine induced and natural immunity hold up against variants that have proven to be very good at breaking through. Since the BA.2 subvariant, and the omicron variant itself, are not as deadly as the Delta variant, perhaps it’s reasonable to assume that this wave will not lead to many deaths.
While it’s certainly true that a certain number of fatalities are inevitable, in my opinion it’s much easier to understand that when we have protections in place to try and mitigate them as much as possible. Right now, we have nothing but hope, yet again. If Doug Ford wants to win another government in June, maybe he’s right to ride the wave of Covid-related apathy and maintain the status quo. But if he wants to prove that he’s capable of leading the province fully out of the pandemic and that he’s actually committed to protecting the lives of his constituents, maybe it’s time to gamble with his own future.