Although Albertans seem to be warming up to the idea of getting the COVID-19 vaccine — with the biggest increase of all provinces in the percentage of those willing to get it immediately — they also continue to lead the country with the most who would give it a flat no.
The shift comes amid weeks of Alberta racking up new record highs of COVID-19 cases almost daily and frequently beating out provinces with double or triple the populations to hold the dubious distinction of the highest total and new active cases per day.
It also comes as the Alberta government starts to roll out the first doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine this week — a shot that it says it won’t make mandatory, raising questions about how the province will try to persuade Albertans to take it and how far employers and service providers can go to require it of staff and customers.
As the vaccinations begin, Angus Reid Institute released poll results Monday suggesting there has been a “notable jump” in the number of people who would take it immediately — especially in Alberta.
The percentage of Albertans who say they’d roll up their sleeves to get the vaccine ASAP has soared from less than a third a month ago to nearly half now, according to the survey from Angus Reid Institute.
Alberta also has the highest percentage of people of all provinces who flat out refuse to take the vaccine. Premier Jason Kenney and the province’s chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, right are encouraging Albertans to get a vaccine, but say they won’t make it mandatory. (Jason Franson/The Canadian Press)
Only 32 per cent of Albertans said a month ago they would want to immediately get the vaccine but that leapt to 47 per cent last week, the polling company said.
That’s almost as high as the national average of 48 per cent of Canadians who say they’d get the vaccine immediately.
27% of Albertans say they won’t take the vaccine
It was the biggest jump in any province of those wanting to get the vaccine immediately, a 47-per-cent leap, compared with an average increase of 20 per cent nationwide.
Another 19 per cent of Albertans now say they’d get the COVID-19 vaccine eventually, Angus Reid said.
But Alberta also has the highest percentage of people of all provinces who flat out refuse to take the vaccine, the poll suggests: 27 per cent, followed by 21 per cent in Saskatchewan and 21 per cent in Manitoba.
The national average was 14 per cent.
The online survey of 1,603 Canadians was completed Dec. 8-11. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.4 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
Angus Reid found the biggest reasons that people say they’d hesitate to take the vaccine immediately related to concerns over safety — short- and long-term side effects from a biological agent that was developed in less than a year. Vaccines can sometimes take up to 10 years to develop, test, trial and receive regulatory approval from public health agencies.
Cases and hospitalizations hit new records
The number of infections and deaths in Alberta have soared dramatically in the past month. The province broke a number of records on Monday, racking up:
The most new infections in a single day at 1,887.
The most total active cases (21,123).
The highest number of people being treated in hospital for COVID (716).
And the most in ICU beds (136).
There were another 15 deaths reported, bringing the total to 733, an increase of more than 100 in one week.
Vaccinations begin this week but won’t be mandatory
The first doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in Alberta will start being given to the highest priority groups this week, but the United Conservative government has said it won’t make the vaccine mandatory.
The first 3,900 doses of the Pfizer vaccine arrived Monday night in Alberta. Premier Jason Kenney says Alberta’s first COVID-19 vaccination would take place on a nurse in south Calgary on Tuesday afternoon, as the province begins immunizing ICU doctors and nurses, respiratory therapists and eligible continuing-care staff in Edmonton and in Calgary.
The cities were chosen because that’s where COVID-19 case numbers are highest and where the health system faces the greatest capacity challenges. As of Monday, Calgary had 7,268 active cases, up from 7,127 reported on Saturday, and Edmonton had 9,778, up from 9,548.
Alberta plans to administer first doses of the COVID vaccine to 29,000 health-care workers by the end of December and hopes to have the first doses available for long-term care residents by the end of the month.
But the government has warned it will take months for the vaccine to reach everyone who wants a shot — and it doesn’t plan to force people to get it.
Kenney has described a mandatory inoculation program as “ridiculous.”
“We’re not going to strap people down to force them to be injected with the vaccine,” Kenney said.
His government will recommend that people get it, he said.
Alberta’s chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, has promised a campaign to help convince Albertans of the benefits.
She has repeatedly assured the public that the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine is effective, pointing out that there have been no serious adverse reactions reported among the tens of thousands of people who have already received the vaccine around the world.
However, how the government is going to encourage people to get vaccinated is not yet clear. Requests for information from government and health officials about an inoculation campaign did not receive a response.
Whether businesses can require vaccinations
Meanwhile, some are wondering how far businesses and service providers can go in requiring vaccinations of employees or customers.
Lorian Hardcastle of the University of Calgary says businesses ‘can certainly’ impose conditions on delivering services but are bound by human rights laws. (Zoom)
Lorian Hardcastle, an associate professor in the faculty of law and the Cumming School of Medicine at the University of Calgary, says businesses “can certainly” impose conditions on delivering services but are bound by human rights laws.
“For example, if you can’t receive the vaccine for medical reasons, WestJet couldn’t deny you the ability to fly on their planes without providing you with reasonable accommodation,” said Hardcastle.
She said that could include proof of a negative COVID-19 test result 24 hours before takeoff.
“There is that requirement, not only with employers, and not only in the public sector, to accommodate human rights, but also private service providers.”
In a statement to CBC News, WestJet and Air Canada indicated it was too early to comment on possible vaccine travel requirements.
Hardcastle pointed out that health-care workers in some parts of the country are already required to either vaccinate or wear a mask to prevent the spread of seasonal influenza within hospitals and long-term care facilities.
Employers could mandate a similar policy for the COVID-19 vaccine. They would have to provide special accommodation for employees who may request an exemption under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, but Hardcastle says there would only be a few options.
WestJet and Air Canada say it’s too early to say how vaccination requirements may look for air travellers. (Darryl Dyck/Canadian Press)
“You have fairly limited ability to challenge your employers,” particularly in a health-care setting, Hardcastle said.
Hardcastle says employers might be reluctant to pursue such a policy since the vaccine is new.
But she points out the vaccine has already been tested on people and approved by Health Canada.
She says, because of that, the window to make an argument becomes quite narrow. She says a pregnant woman might be more successful in arguing against a mandatory vaccine because vaccines haven’t been tested on pregnant women.
The Alberta Human Rights Commission issued statements earlier this year regarding COVID-19 and individual rights around mandatory mask requirements and how, for example, someone with a disability or a health condition, such as asthma, could be exempted from wearing a mask.
Vaccine safety campaign
Health-care providers and researchers say one of the biggest challenges of the pandemic has been battling what’s referred to as the infodemic — the spread of false information and conspiracy theories around COVID-19.
Dr. Ilan Schwartz describes it as a “raging epidemic of misinformation.”
Dr. Ilan Schwartz says health-care professionals must battle an ‘infodemic’ of misinformation and conspiracy theories around COVID-19. (Zoom)
“We’ve come to a point where expertise and science is being given an equal platform to people who have opinions on Facebook,” said Dr. Schwartz, who is an infectious disease physician and an assistant professor in the division of infectious disease at the University of Alberta.
This vaccine has been developed at lightning pace, but there have been no corners cut.– Dr. Ilan Schwartz, infectious disease specialist
He says physicians need to make it clear to their patients and also to the community that this is something that is safe and effective and recommended.
He says even though the vaccine may appear to have been fast tracked, it is safe.
“This vaccine has been developed at lightning pace, but there have been no corners cut,” he said.
“It’s important that we, you know, gain and maintain the trust of the public. And so we want to be able to give them all the information that they are going to require in order to make an informed and safe decision.”
Bryan Labby is an enterprise reporter with CBC Calgary. If you have a good story idea or tip, you can reach him at bryan.labby@cbc.ca or on Twitter at @CBCBryan.
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.
HALIFAX – The Nova Scotia government says it could be months before it reveals how many people are on the wait-list for a family doctor.
The head of the province’s health authority told reporters Wednesday that the government won’t release updated data until the 160,000 people who were on the wait-list in June are contacted to verify whether they still need primary care.
Karen Oldfield said Nova Scotia Health is working on validating the primary care wait-list data before posting new numbers, and that work may take a matter of months. The most recent public wait-list figures are from June 1, when 160,234 people, or about 16 per cent of the population, were on it.
“It’s going to take time to make 160,000 calls,” Oldfield said. “We are not talking weeks, we are talking months.”
The interim CEO and president of Nova Scotia Health said people on the list are being asked where they live, whether they still need a family doctor, and to give an update on their health.
A spokesperson with the province’s Health Department says the government and its health authority are “working hard” to turn the wait-list registry into a useful tool, adding that the data will be shared once it is validated.
Nova Scotia’s NDP are calling on Premier Tim Houston to immediately release statistics on how many people are looking for a family doctor. On Tuesday, the NDP introduced a bill that would require the health minister to make the number public every month.
“It is unacceptable for the list to be more than three months out of date,” NDP Leader Claudia Chender said Tuesday.
Chender said releasing this data regularly is vital so Nova Scotians can track the government’s progress on its main 2021 campaign promise: fixing health care.
The number of people in need of a family doctor has more than doubled between the 2021 summer election campaign and June 2024. Since September 2021 about 300 doctors have been added to the provincial health system, the Health Department said.
“We’ll know if Tim Houston is keeping his 2021 election promise to fix health care when Nova Scotians are attached to primary care,” Chender said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
ST. JOHN’S, N.L. – Newfoundland and Labrador‘s chief medical officer is monitoring the rise of whooping cough infections across the province as cases of the highly contagious disease continue to grow across Canada.
Dr. Janice Fitzgerald says that so far this year, the province has recorded 230 confirmed cases of the vaccine-preventable respiratory tract infection, also known as pertussis.
Late last month, Quebec reported more than 11,000 cases during the same time period, while Ontario counted 470 cases, well above the five-year average of 98. In Quebec, the majority of patients are between the ages of 10 and 14.
Meanwhile, New Brunswick has declared a whooping cough outbreak across the province. A total of 141 cases were reported by last month, exceeding the five-year average of 34.
The disease can lead to severe complications among vulnerable populations including infants, who are at the highest risk of suffering from complications like pneumonia and seizures. Symptoms may start with a runny nose, mild fever and cough, then progress to severe coughing accompanied by a distinctive “whooping” sound during inhalation.
“The public, especially pregnant people and those in close contact with infants, are encouraged to be aware of symptoms related to pertussis and to ensure vaccinations are up to date,” Newfoundland and Labrador’s Health Department said in a statement.
Whooping cough can be treated with antibiotics, but vaccination is the most effective way to control the spread of the disease. As a result, the province has expanded immunization efforts this school year. While booster doses are already offered in Grade 9, the vaccine is now being offered to Grade 8 students as well.
Public health officials say whooping cough is a cyclical disease that increases every two to five or six years.
Meanwhile, New Brunswick’s acting chief medical officer of health expects the current case count to get worse before tapering off.
A rise in whooping cough cases has also been reported in the United States and elsewhere. The Pan American Health Organization issued an alert in July encouraging countries to ramp up their surveillance and vaccination coverage.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 10, 2024.
