A commentary by an associate professor at the School of Nursing at the University of Victoria.
A serious threat to the health of everyone in B.C. is at our door and we need to take immediate action to protect the health of our families, our most vulnerable and ourselves.
I have worked as a registered nurse in Canada for many years, but I come to you now as a daughter, a mother, a grandmother and a concerned citizen.
Many of us are very tired of the social distancing that we have been practising for almost a year and are desperate to return to some semblance of normal life.
Unfortunately, the virus that causes COVID-19 has mutated to much more contagious and therefore dangerous forms.
As we do very little testing in the general population, not many cases of the COVID-19 variants have been reported in B.C.
The prudent approach must be to assume that these variants are already among us, something that is difficult to believe when you live on Vancouver Island, where most of us have been relatively isolated from the devastating effects of these viral infections and their debilitating long-term after-effects.
So what are the dangers that these new variants pose to citizens of B.C., our families and the world?
Here is a brief summary:
1. When this pandemic began, we knew very little about how to prevent the spread of the virus that cause COVID-19 infections.
At the time, the public health measures instituted in B.C. and much of Canada seemed to work fairly well for “flattening the curve” to decrease the impact on our health systems, but at a terrible price for our seniors in long-term care, for prisoners and corrections staff, for people without safe housing and for other vulnerable groups.
2. The response from the scientific community has been amazing and new vaccines have been developed in record time.
We have had time to compare the impact of different public-health responses, noting that Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Atlantic Canada have reduced their baseline rates of this infection to near-zero levels, giving these places more capacity to respond swiftly and regain some control over their lives.
3. The new highly contagious variants of the COVID-19 viruses change everything. This is essentially a new virus that does not obey the “old rules.” Since the identified strains are highly contagious (like measles) they spread in a population at an exponential rate with much shorter doubling times.
4. Being more contagious, these new viruses are more deadly. Scientists have noted their rapid spread among school-age children and to their families.
Our vaccination programs cannot be implemented fast enough to protect our citizens (which may partly explain why some of the more unscrupulous wealthy people are “jumping the queue” to get their vaccines).
5. We also know much more about the long-term health impacts of COVID-19 on survivors of this viral infection.
I believe that it is once again time close our schools (other than online or small group learning), our borders and cancel our travel plans (particularly with March Break coming).
We must get on top of these viruses before these new variants cripple our health-care system with devastating impacts for everyone.
A moral and democratic society must prioritize care for the most vulnerable among us. In the past, I too thought that the middle way might work, but we now have a better understanding of what we need to do to get on top of this pandemic.
We, the people of this province, can work together to make a difference. If it can be done in Australia and Atlantic Canada, we can do this here and now.
