Canada’s senior scientific adviser, Mona Nemer, warns Canadians that the new coronavirus may get worse before it improves, despite the progress researchers have made in seizing a vaccine.
When asked if there was a possibility of hospitals succumbing to the recent outbreak of COVID-19 cases, Nemer said that some parts of the country were in danger of being hit if the upward trend in positive control effects continued.
“Hospitals are, in some areas, above one hundred% of their capacity in emergency rooms that already have non-COVID cases,” he says.
“So it’s imaginable that if we have to deal with massive instances of COVID-19, we’ll overwhelm the formula and hate for that to happen in Canada.
Nemer, who provides clinical recommendations to the federal government to publicize evidence-based decision-making, commented in an extensive interview with Global News on the state of the global pandemic and Canada’s efforts to curb the spread of the virus.
He said researchers will probably know until the end of this year if they have developed a usable vaccine; if so, he said, Canadians may have until early 2021.
“We have vaccines,” he says.
“What we are still waiting to know is whether vaccination will prevent infection or serious illness in inflamed people. “
Nemer’s warning about the dangers to hospitals comes less than a week after local fitness officials in Ottawa said the city’s fitness formula “is in crisis. “
“I’m sounding the alarm. It’s our precautionary bell,” said Vera Etches, Ottawa Health Medical Officer, on October 2, after 142 new CASES of COVID-19 were announced in the city in an undesired day.
Meanwhile, Nemer’s comments on vaccines echo statements made through Minister of Public Utilities and Public Procurement Anita Anand in early September that she hopes to have a vaccine early next year.
Canada has signed agreements with at least primary pharmaceutical corporations to acquire tens of millions of doses of vaccines once all those corporations are ready: Modern, Pfizer, Novavax, Johnson
Meanwhile, however, Canadians will still have to adhere to public fitness guidelines, such as dressing in masks, physical distance, and avoiding social gatherings, Nemer said.
“It’s incredibly important,” he says. Otherwise, we still won’t have any options to go back to the lockout. Schools have closed and there are many difficulties in terms of fitness and economics.
Nemer’s task is to stay on top of the latest clinical studies and advise the government on how to make “science-based” policy decisions.
Her role in the pandemic was necessarily as Chief Scientific Coordinator, working with the various trained teams established through the government, and then keeping politicians informed about their findings.
In an article published through the National Observer on October 6, Nemer said he believed from the beginning of the pandemic that Canada could be saved from the worst of the virus.
Since then, she told Global News that it was because she and other scientists thought that population density would likely play a vital role in the rate of spread of the virus, meaning that Canada is less densely populated than China, so it was imaginable that fewer people would get sick.
This, of course, turned out to be false. Canada has not escaped the worst of the virus and, to the total number of cases shown, has a particularly higher mortality rate than in many other countries, adding the United States.
The military was also called to long-term care services in Ontario and Quebec that lacked the resources to prevent the spread of the virus. Thousands of citizens have died in these settlements, many of whom have not been able to see their circle of family members one last time.
“There were a number of circumstances, if you wish, that made us think that if we could restrict the importation (of the virus) and the spread of the community, or absolutely prevent the spread of the community, it would be better cope with it than the others,” he said. But obviously not. “
Nemer said what happened in long-term care is massively lost and explains much of the difference between the virus mortality rate in Canada compared to other countries.
“Tragedy was what happened to the elderly, long-term care homes and nursing homes,” he says.
Politicians and public health officials in Canada insisted from the beginning of the pandemic that no masks were needed to stop the spread of the virus. But that recommendation has been gradually replaced to say that the mask, which was scarce at the time, will be a priority for fitness professionals and other essential workers.
Six months later, masks are mandatory in maximum public spaces, on planes and airports, even in apartment buildings.
Nemer says this probably contradictory recommendation comes down to the fact that scientists didn’t know enough how the mask can prevent the spread of the virus at the beginning of the pandemic.
“The mask factor is complicated because we have not done studies,” he said.
At first, the researchers thought the virus was basically spreading through small droplets that remained on the surfaces, but that has replaced since then, Nemer said, and many scientists now think the virus can be transmitted through “aerosols” or through the air.
“This is exactly where masks are incredibly vital because you need to restrict airborne spread as much as possible,” Nemer said.
Another main concern, Nemer said, is incorrect information about the virus, how it spreads and the severity of its threat.
He stopped before directly criticizing U. S. President Donald Trump, who, after testing positive for COVID-19, continued to minimize the virus by saying other people are not afraid of him and cutting off his mask in public.
However, he said politicians have a duty to tell other people the fact and warn them of the dangers they face.
“The truth is that we have more than a million people who have died from this virus. And I’m sure a lot of other people know other people around them who have had it,” he said.
Nemer also stated that there are significant differences between the new coronavirus and non-unusual diseases such as influenza, including possible long-term consequences, such as heart, lung and kidney damage, caused by COVID-19.
He added that the researchers did not have enough time to fully perceive the effects of the virus on other people of other ages and genders.
“We have no way of predicting who will be affected in the short and long term and who will not,” he said. “We don’t know who will be the most vulnerable. “
There have also been conflicting recommendations on the evidence, what should be tested, and when.
In Ontario, Prime Minister Doug Ford encouraged everyone to be tested. Provincial fitness officials have also established policies that require testing of anyone who is potentially exposed to the virus or who has been in close contact with a user with demonstrated infection.
But that has replaced since then, especially as the province struggles to stay speed with the call for exams after schools, day care centers and other businesses reopen. Ontario residents are now told that they will only be tested if they have the greatest threat or symptoms.
Nemer did not say whether he believed that the provinces had failed to adequately increase detection levels or who was guilty of these perceived failures.
However, he said that tests are essential to slow the spread of the virus and that immediate new tests, which are less accurate than classic tests but much faster to generate effects, will likely increase the ability of the provinces to know who it is. and he’s not sick.
“What we lose in terms of sensitivity, we in terms of speed,” he says.
Nemer says that, in the end, Canada is well positioned against the virus as long as the provinces, territories, and federal government continue to work together and Canadians continue to abide by public fitness guidelines.
It’s also that other people don’t give in to the temptation to go back to general too quickly, he said.
“The moment the wave will look like we’re making it look,” he said. “So I urge everyone to make those little sacrifices. “