Sims: Vigilance, following rules only way to turn third wave into ripple

Article content

There was something medical officer of health Chris Mackie said last week during the vaccination ramp up that’s been niggling at me.

The health unit went from zero to hero to make appointments available for people 80 and older. By moving some vaccine chess pieces around, it was able to offer thousands of first-dose dates during the next two weeks, even before the province announced its updated and, hopefully, speedy rollout.

At the time, Mackie said it was all hands on deck “to get vaccines in arms as soon as possible, so we are as ready as possible for any third-wave type of activity.”

The third wave. The optimist in me kept telling myself if we just keep vaccinating people, surely a third wave would look like a gentle lapping on a Lake Erie beach on a calm summer night, rather than a large Lake Huron swell in gale-force winds.

But then, on Sunday, came news of a variant case at Saunders secondary school.

Article content

Variants. The U.K, the South African, the Brazilian. More contagious, maybe more deadly. We’ve been warned for weeks. We shouldn’t be surprised.

But before we all start believing the sky is falling, we need to check for rain.

Monday’s local stats, on a day when the Middlesex-London numbers, like those of the province, jumped dramatically, included four confirmed variant cases and another 21 screened as variant positive.

One variant case was from Saunders. At Monday’s news briefing, Mackie said it was detected last week followed by a secondary test in Toronto. Those Toronto results come back in 48 to 72 hours.

If there is a variant, then it takes another week to get the whole genome sequencing that identifies which variant is present.

So, any close contacts and classmates of the positive case should have been notified and be isolating for about a week already.

Does this mean Saunders is now a festering pool of variant COVID-19? No, Mackie said, and the situation can be managed the same way as any other school case. No mention of needing rapid testing.

“We have no concern that this is something that has spread through the school community,” he said. “Almost all of what we are seeing in school mirrors what we were seeing in the fall. Schools are a reflection of spread in the community. There is not much spread, if at all, in schools.”

Kudos, once again, to staff and students across the region for keeping up with public health protocols. We’ve had some cases but they’ve really been champs. That same diligence needs to carry on everywhere else.

Article content

Mackie said 20 to 30 per cent of all new cases are testing positive for a variant of concern, up significantly even from a week ago. They’re not travel cases, but spread from close contact with a positive case.

That points to more maskless contact going on indoors now that restrictions have loosened to the orange level of the provincial framework.

Other troubling signs? How about warnings at Masonville Place to people who were walking around with their face masks around their chins? Or reports of people out celebrating their recent vaccinations, even though they won’t be protected for 12 to 14 days after they receive their shots?

It’s a cliché, I know, but we’re at a crossroads. Mackie said 20,000 people 80 and older outside of long-term and retirement homes are booked for shots, out of about 30,000 in the catchment area, getting us close to the end of that age group. So far, 2,000 to 3,000 have received their first shots.

Bigger deliveries of vaccine are on the way and one, or maybe two, more mass vaccination centres could be open by early April as this all ramps up.

“Really, it’s a race now,” Mackie said. “Can we get enough vaccine into arms so we really are able to weather what seems to be coming, which is a third wave?”

Time for the pandemic mantra. Masks, physical distancing and hand washing are as important as ever, both at school and everywhere else.

I want the third wave to be a flood of vaccine. Or a wave good-bye to the pandemic.

jsims@postmedia.com

twitter.com/JaneatLFPress

Article content