Not to jinx anything, but Canadians are currently enjoying a lull in the COVID-19 pandemic.
After a scary month of April, when most proof-of-vaccination requirements, mask mandates and indoor capacity limits were first lifted across the country and hospitalizations threatened to once again spike, we appear to have reached a moment of relative calm. We may even be, as has always been the hope, living with the disease.
You can detect it in the way daily reports about cases and hospitalizations no longer rise to the top of the news. This is in part due to the fact most provinces have stopped providing daily data, choosing instead to release them once a week.
But even the provinces that continue to release detailed daily numbers – Quebec and Ontario – are not showing eye-popping increases. In Ontario, hospitalizations have been flatlining, sometimes rising and sometimes falling, but they aren’t spiking the way they did in December and January, with the rise of Omicron.
Life feels almost normal. Many are masking up in public indoor spaces, but many others aren’t, and there is little rancour about it. The NHL playoffs are taking place in packed arenas in three Canadian cities. Ontario is holding a general election, and the pandemic, past and future, has so far barely rated a mention from the three major parties.
Right now, most people would probably rather read an editorial about the importance of dental hygiene than one about COVID-19. And politicians would rather talk about anything else.
But the hard truth is that COVID-19 is not done with us. Some Canadians are still getting sick enough to require hospitalization; about 6,500 were in hospital on Tuesday. And people are still dying; Canada is averaging nearly 70 deaths a day, and closing in on 40,000 deaths since early 2020.
We also know from bitter experience that this virus comes in waves. Like the weather, things can change quickly – New York is seeing a sharp rise in cases this month after a period of relative quiet, and is considering bringing back some of the restrictions it removed earlier this year.
But we also know that we have the ability to change the course of the virus, and its impact on us. We have vaccines.
So the simple message is, if you are enjoying this respite from two-plus years of COVID-19 restrictions, COVID-19 fears and a health care system overwhelmed by COVID-19, and you want it to continue, get vaccinated.
Canada’s high vaccination rate has been key to diminishing the link between infection and severe illness, thereby preventing an unmanageable spike in hospitalizations. Other than restrictions, vaccinations are the one tool for limiting the future impact of COVID-19 that people and governments can actually control.
Except that right now, almost no one is bothering. At 82 per cent of the population, Canada has a high double-vaccination rate, especially compared with the United States (67 per cent). But two doses are no longer enough to prevent the worst outcomes of an infection, particularly for older people, because of the waning effectiveness of vaccines over time.
The National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) strongly recommended last month that every adult get a third dose of vaccine. But while the rollout for the elderly that started in February has been efficient, and 48.4 per cent of Canadians have had a third shot, the effort to get boosters into the remainder of the population is dead in the water.
The website covid19tracker.ca calculates that Canada is averaging about 12,000 new third doses a day. Given that there are almost 31 million Canadian adults, and roughly half have been boosted, finishing the job at the current pace will take around three and a half years.
This is setting Canada up for trouble. The second-best tool we have for limiting the impact of future waves of COVID-19 are booster shots. The best tool? A first and second dose for the small percentage of adults who are still unvaccinated.
Governments need to stop pretending that the COVID-19 virus is history. Instead, they need to keep the focus on taking steps to make sure the pandemic really does become history. That means constant reminders of the importance of getting a jab, and making vaccines as easy as possible to get.
Think of it like brushing your teeth: A way of preventing an unpleasant medical procedure tomorrow, by taking a simple preventive measure today.
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