HALIFAX —
Erica Surette is looking for answers to some very painful questions.
She wants to know how her 66-year-old mother contracted COVID-19 and passed away at the Northwood long-term care facility in Halifax.
“Mom was nowhere near her time,” said Surette.
“She would still call me and say, ‘Let’s go to the mall, I need to go get something at Reitmans, let’s go for lunch or let’s go for a drive,’ and that I don’t have that anymore. That’s not fair.”
Patricia West moved into Northwood in 2017, after being diagnosed with early onset dementia. Surette says her mother was moved from a single room to a shared room in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic.
West tested positive for the virus on Easter weekend and died on April 22.
“Throughout all of this, everything that we’ve been told is, everyone is doing the best they can and they’re taking the appropriate steps and appropriate measures are in place and my mom and all these other families, they’re still gone, so something went off the rails somewhere,” said Surette.
“Her death and all the other residents who have passed, all the other families who have lost loved ones, it can’t be for nothing.”
Lawyer Ray Wagner says Northwood knew the virus was coming and the impact it was having on long-term care homes.
“It seems that New Brunswick was prepared. It seems that P.E.I. was prepared. And it seems that a lot of the private facilities were prepared. But Northwood wasn’t,” he said.
To date, 53 residents have died from COVID-19 at Northwood, making it one of the hardest hit long-term care homes in the country.
The lawsuit alleges that Northwood Halifax’s practices, policies, and procedures, and lack thereof, caused the viral spread of COVID-19 through elderly and vulnerable residents, as well as staff, causing untimely death to residents, and harms, losses, and damages to their surviving family members, who make up the proposed class.
It also alleges that Northwood had full knowledge and advance warning of the dangers and health risks posed by a COVID-19 pandemic, and they knew how the rapid spread of infection could be mitigated by maintaining and enforcing physical distancing. Yet, they maintained the status quoat the cost of numerous individuals’ safety and lives, states the court document.
“What happened is very important, not only because it gives answers to people and they can say, ‘I know what happened,’ it’s more than that. It is about the answers leading to changes, changes so that we don’t have to be looking for answers for a repeat of what happened,” said Wagner.
In addition to the proposed class-action lawsuit, Surette wants to see government call an inquiry into the situation at Northwood.
“We have other long-term care facilities, even here in our province, that have had maybe one case, two cases, zero cases. And there are 53 deaths at Northwood and you don’t think that calls for an inquiry?” she said.
Despite growing calls for an inquiry, Premier Stephen McNeil did not call for one on Wednesday.
He did, however, say government continues to work with Northwood to ensure they eradicate the virus and that there have been ongoing conversations about shared rooms.
“There was a number of conversations between the Department of Health and Northwood and they’ll still be ongoing,” said McNeil.
Dr. Samir Sinha, the director of geriatrics at Mount Sinai and the University Health Network Hospitals in Toronto, says the COVID-19 virus preys on seniors.
“When we start looking at seniors who are in their 70s, their 80s and 90s, we see death rates of up to eight, 15 and 25 per cent.”
Sinha says we now know that older homes that have multi-bedded rooms are more likely to face outbreaks and have significant death counts.
“That becomes really difficult when people are living in two or three or four people to a room at the same time and we’ve seen how devastating those consequences can be, especially in older homes” said Sinha.
“When you actually look at the number of people who have passed away at Northwood, many who are living in two-bedded rooms, for example, that’s more deaths than have occurred in countries like South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, and even Hong Kong. Countries that, frankly, eliminated the development of multi-bedded rooms after SARS.”
The statement of claim has not been proven in court.
The next step in the proposed class-action lawsuit is for it to be certified by a court.
Wagner hopes he will be able to Skype with a judge sometime in the near future to set a date for the hearing.
TORONTO – Health Canada has authorized Moderna’s updated COVID-19 vaccine that protects against currently circulating variants of the virus.
The mRNA vaccine, called Spikevax, has been reformulated to target the KP.2 subvariant of Omicron.
It will replace the previous version of the vaccine that was released a year ago, which targeted the XBB.1.5 subvariant of Omicron.
Health Canada recently asked provinces and territories to get rid of their older COVID-19 vaccines to ensure the most current vaccine will be used during this fall’s respiratory virus season.
Health Canada is also reviewing two other updated COVID-19 vaccines but has not yet authorized them.
They are Pfizer’s Comirnaty, which is also an mRNA vaccine, as well as Novavax’s protein-based vaccine.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 17, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
VANCOUVER – Mayors and other leaders from several British Columbia communities say the provincial and federal governments need to take “immediate action” to tackle mental health and public safety issues that have reached crisis levels.
Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim says it’s become “abundantly clear” that mental health and addiction issues and public safety have caused crises that are “gripping” Vancouver, and he and other politicians, First Nations leaders and law enforcement officials are pleading for federal and provincial help.
In a letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier David Eby, mayors say there are “three critical fronts” that require action including “mandatory care” for people with severe mental health and addiction issues.
The letter says senior governments also need to bring in “meaningful bail reform” for repeat offenders, and the federal government must improve policing at Metro Vancouver ports to stop illicit drugs from coming in and stolen vehicles from being exported.
Sim says the “current system” has failed British Columbians, and the number of people dealing with severe mental health and addiction issues due to lack of proper care has “reached a critical point.”
Vancouver Police Chief Adam Palmer says repeat violent offenders are too often released on bail due to a “revolving door of justice,” and a new approach is needed to deal with mentally ill people who “pose a serious and immediate danger to themselves and others.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024
The Canadian government says it will donate up to 200,000 vaccine doses to fight the mpox outbreak in Congo and other African countries.
It says the donated doses of Imvamune will come from Canada’s existing supply and will not affect the country’s preparedness for mpox cases in this country.
Minister of Health Mark Holland says the donation “will help to protect those in the most affected regions of Africa and will help prevent further spread of the virus.”
Dr. Madhukar Pai, Canada research chair in epidemiology and global health, says although the donation is welcome, it is a very small portion of the estimated 10 million vaccine doses needed to control the outbreak.
Vaccine donations from wealthier countries have only recently started arriving in Africa, almost a month after the World Health Organization declared the mpox outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.
A few days after the declaration in August, Global Affairs Canada announced a contribution of $1 million for mpox surveillance, diagnostic tools, research and community awareness in Africa.
On Thursday, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said mpox is still on the rise and that testing rates are “insufficient” across the continent.
Jason Kindrachuk, Canada research chair in emerging viruses at the University of Manitoba, said donating vaccines, in addition to supporting surveillance and diagnostic tests, is “massively important.”
But Kindrachuk, who has worked on the ground in Congo during the epidemic, also said that the international response to the mpox outbreak is “better late than never (but) better never late.”
“It would have been fantastic for us globally to not be in this position by having provided doses a much, much longer time prior than when we are,” he said, noting that the outbreak of clade I mpox in Congo started in early 2023.
Clade II mpox, endemic in regions of West Africa, came to the world’s attention even earlier — in 2022 — as that strain of virus spread to other countries, including Canada.
Two doses are recommended for mpox vaccination, so the donation may only benefit 100,000 people, Pai said.
Pai questioned whether Canada is contributing enough, as the federal government hasn’t said what percentage of its mpox vaccine stockpile it is donating.
“Small donations are simply not going to help end this crisis. We need to show greater solidarity and support,” he said in an email.
“That is the biggest lesson from the COVID-19 pandemic — our collective safety is tied with that of other nations.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
