Stamping out the virus regionally in Canada, without a vaccine, is an enticing possibility. But what are the costs?
Canada’s border with the U.S., and its world-leading case load, impedes elimination efforts
The E-word became a point of great national pride, but just eight days after Ardern made her declaration, New Zealand reported that two women recently arrived from the United Kingdom had tested positive. Over the next two weeks, a string of cases trickled into the country from overseas travel, and by Aug. 11, its 102-day streak without community transmission had come to an end, with an outbreak among four members of a family in Auckland.
With the exception of Nunavut and the Northwest Territories, Canada has seen its own uptick in infections following loosened restrictions and reopened economies over the summer. Some Atlantic provinces have more or less planked their curves, raising at least the possibility of squelching it within the region. But most medical officers of health, including Nova Scotia’s Robert Strang, are reluctant to prescribe elimination as a strategy.
Even in P.E.I., Chief Health Officer Heather Morrison says the cost of achieving elimination would be too high. With the benefit of hindsight, she is still hesitant to describe the lull as such. “I don’t think we ever thought about it as being totally eliminated because the risk of importation has always been there,” she said. “As long as the virus exists in the country and in the world, it’s going to be difficult to eliminate.
Isaac Bogoch, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Toronto, agrees that aiming to eliminate the virus without a viable vaccine is a laudable goal. But gaps in diagnostic processes and the body of knowledge surrounding the pathogen, he says, make it unrealistic. Tests, while functional, are not 100 per cent accurate. Surveillance systems for the early detection of outbreaks , while decent, are far from perfect.
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