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Canada needs to jump-start a stalled first-dose campaign to avoid a fourth wave, experts say – CBC.ca

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3 years ago

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Canada has gone from a vaccine laggard to a world leader in COVID-19 immunizations in just a few months’ time — thanks to an ambitious vaccination campaign that has so far blunted the spread of the much more virulent delta variant.

More than 79 per cent of those eligible for a shot have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.

While that’s a high number, it suggests there are still more than six million people over the age of 12 who have chosen to forgo a shot altogether, or wait for a later date.

The number of unvaccinated Canadians is roughly equivalent to everyone living in the Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, Winnipeg and Quebec City metropolitan areas combined.

Experts agree more people need to get the shot to avoid another pandemic resurgence with devastating consequences. The challenge now involves easing access and convincing the hesitant among us to roll up their sleeves, experts say.

After a blitz in April and May, the number of new first doses being administered has stalled at well under 100,000 daily since June 16. That means it would take months more to immunize the remaining holdouts at the current pace.

  • Thinking about getting a COVID-19 vaccine, but aren’t quite sure? We want to talk to you for an upcoming story: Email us: COVID@cbc.ca

Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada’s chief public health officer, said recently the vaccination campaign has produced impressive results. But it’s not enough, she said, to simply hit the government’s early target of 75 per cent of the eligible population with a single shot when the much more contagious delta variant — which appears to be twice as virulent as other strains — is circulating widely.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the doctor leading the COVID-19 fight in the U.S., was among those who first suggested “herd immunity” against the virus would develop at a 75 to 80 per cent vaccination rate. The new variants may have rendered that target obsolete.

“Should we aim for higher? Yes, I think we should. Shoot for higher, shoot for gold, shoot for the stars. That gives us a better buffer for managing the COVID-19 situation,” Tam said.

“We’ve got some work to do,” Dr. Howard Njoo, Tam’s deputy, tolda press conference Thursday. “I think we could obviously do better.”

WATCH: Dr. Njoo discusses COVID-19 booster shots

Dr. Njoo says while research on the need for a booster shot is under way, his main focus now is on fully vaccinating Canadians. 1:59

Caroline Colijn is a mathematician who specializes in infectious diseases at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, B.C.

Colijn told CBC News it’s hard to pinpoint an exact vaccination rate that would make it safer to further relax pandemic-related restrictions in Canada — but it should be higher than it is now.

More shots in arms could spell the difference between a fourth pandemic wave — like the crush of new cases piling up in the U.K. and the Netherlands — and no wave at all, Colijn said, citing some of the modelling she and her team of researchers have compiled.

“There is a lot of uncertainty and I don’t think we have one number where we can say ‘Oh, OK, it’s 82 per cent, that’s it, that’s enough and we won’t have COVID anymore,'” she said. “But we do know that 90 per cent would give us so much better protection than 80 per cent because it cuts in half the number of people who aren’t protected at all.”

Colijn said that at 90 per cent protection, there will be both fewer cases and fewer opportunities for new mutations to emerge because there won’t be as many unvaccinated vectors for the virus.

“I’m not going to say we’re going to be in the clear. We don’t know how much immunity will wane over time, hopefully it won’t. But I think it would put us in a really great position,” she said. “We can say with high confidence we’ll be in a much, much better position at 90 per cent. We’ll cut those chains of transmission and we’ll be more resilient to the arrival, spread or emergence of new variants.”

Widespread infections among millions of unvaccinated Canadians could be enough to overwhelm the health care system again. New variants also threaten to penetrate the high level of protection that the fully vaccinated currently enjoy.

“It’s even more important for us to really reach a high level of vaccinations when we start to see variants that can break through that vaccination. You just need that much more vaccination to get to the same place,” Colijn said.

The federal government’s own modelling, released late last month, suggests hospital capacity may again reach dangerous levels in the fall and winter months if vaccine coverage is at or below 80 per cent across all age groups with the contagious delta variant as the dominant strain.

(CBC News)

In the United Kingdom, where 87.6 per cent of adults have had a first shot, hospitalizations have increased to levels not seen since February, with 600 daily admissions and reports of 50,000 new cases — most of them of the delta variety — each day. The number of people in hospital with coronavirus could reach “quite scary” levels within weeks, England’s chief medical officer Chris Whitty said Friday.

‘Rural areas have had the biggest problems’

In Ontario, a province where vaccines have been relatively plentiful in most areas for weeks, vaccination coverage varies greatly by region and age.

While vaccine uptake has been extraordinarily high among older Canadians, in many jurisdictions the 18-29 age cohort has been noticeably less willing.

In the City of Ottawa, for example, well over 90 per cent of residents 70 years of age and older have had at least one shot — an enviable level of coverage. As of July 14, fewer than 70 per cent of people aged 18 to 29 have had that first dose.

In rural Renfrew County, a sprawling region in eastern Ontario, the vaccination campaign has hit a wall of vaccine hesitancy.

Earlier this month, some areas in the county reported first-dose vaccination rates at just 50 per cent, according to provincial data — while urban areas like Toronto and the suburbs in Peel Region had coverage rates that were some 15 to 20 points higher.

Dr. Rob Cushman, the medical officer of health for Renfrew County, told CBC News that 90 to 95 per cent of the shots administered in his jurisdiction over the past three weeks have been second doses, even though just 72 per cent of the people in the area have had a first dose. (That last number is likely somewhat higher, Cushman said, because vaccinations among Canadian Forces service members have not yet been factored into the local numbers. There’s a large military base in Petawawa, Ont.)

“It’s a big problem. Some of our rural areas have had the biggest problems,” Cushman said. “These people who haven’t been vaccinated in the 20 to 45 years of age crowd — they’re going to suffer the most, they’re going to get it and they’re going to give it to their kids. We really have to motivate them even though they’re young and they may think they’re invincible.”

Cushman said lower vaccine rates can be explained in part by access problems for rural dwellers; he’s already planning pop-up clinics in smaller communities in the coming days. But he estimates that as much as 10 per cent of the population won’t get the shot, no matter what.

“There’s a real dig-in-your-heels anti-vax crowd and you have distrust of government, libertarianism, anti-science and all these things,” he said.

Acting medical officer of health for the Renfrew County and District Public Health Unit Dr. Rob Cushman is warning that people between the ages of 18 and 45 are falling behind other age groups on vaccination. (Renfrew County and District Health Unit/YouTube)

There’s another group of people, Cushman said, who are not fiercely opposed to getting a shot but are worried about possible side effects, suffer from needle-related phobias or feel lingering anxiety about the pace at which these products were developed.

He said there’s also a perception that, because many rural areas have been spared the high caseloads reported in some cities, Canadians in more remote areas face a lower risk of infection.

“We’ve done very well compared to the city and people think we’re more immune,” he said. “But what we’re seeing now — and I didn’t know this even three months ago — is just how high the vaccination rate needs to be to get herd immunity. It’s a matter of really convincing people, and it’s a hard sell, let me tell you.”

Lagging vaccination rates have been reported in other rural regions. Recent polling conducted by the Saskatchewan Population Health Evaluation and Research Unit found a vaccine acceptance rate of less than 64 per cent in some parts of the province’s northern and southern regions, compared to 74 to 89 per cent in urban areas like Regina and Saskatoon.

Beyond smaller pop-up clinics designed to target the holdouts, Cushman is considering more personalized interventions — sending public health workers door-to-door to connect with unvaccinated homes and empowering more family doctors to give the shot.

“This is when the hard slog starts,” he said.

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With grief lingering, Blue Jackets GM Waddell places focus on hockey in wake of Gaudreau’s death

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36 mins ago

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September 16, 2024

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BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) — Hearing the familiar sounds of clacking sticks and pucks banging off the boards and glass while watching Columbus Blue Jackets prospects from the stands of a cold rink on a warm late-summer afternoon was not enough to wash away the lingering residuals of grief for Don Waddell on Saturday.

That, the Blue Jackets’ general manager acknowledged, will take more time than anyone can guess — weeks, months, perhaps an entire season and beyond.

What mattered is how spending the weekend attending the Sabres Prospects Challenge represented a start to what Waddell called among the first steps in refocusing on hockey and the future in the aftermath of the deaths of Columbus star Johnny Gaudreau and his brother, Matthew, who were struck by a suspected drunken driver while riding bicycles on Aug 29.

“We got to play hockey,” Waddell said. “We’re not going to forget about Johnny and his family, the Gaudreau family.”

He then reflected on the speech Johnny Gaudreau’s wife, Meredith, made during the brothers’ funeral on Monday, by urging those in mourning to move forward as she will while focusing on raising their children.

“Everybody knows that Johnny wants them to play hockey,” Waddell said. “And everybody’s rallying around that.”

The resumption of hockey in Columbus began last week, when most Blue Jackets players returned to their facility to be together and lean on each other at the urging of Waddell and team captain Boone Jenner. And it will continue on Thursday, when the team opens training camp, exactly three weeks since the Gaudreaus were killed.

“Tragic. Senseless. But now we got to focus on trying to get our team ready to play hockey this year,” Waddell said. “We all mourn and heal differently, but I think as a team being together like that is going to be critical for them to get moving forward.”

Tragedy is no stranger to Waddell or the Blue Jackets.

Waddell was general manager of the then-Atlanta Thrashers in 2003 when Dany Heatley lost control of his car and struck a wall, with the crash killing passenger and teammate Dan Snyder. In 2021, Blue Jackets goalie Matiss Kivlenieks died during a July Fourth fireworks accident.

Waddell placed the emphasis on himself and coach Dean Evason — both newcomers to Columbus this offseason — to guide the team through what will be an emotional season.

“Now, do I think there’s going to be some dark days? I won’t be surprised,” Waddell said.

Reminders of the Gaudreaus’ deaths remain apparent, and reflected in Buffalo on Friday night. A moment of silence was held in tribute to the brothers before the opening faceoff of a game between the Blue Jackets and Sabres.

Afterward, Columbus prospect Gavin Brindley recalled the times he spent with Johnny Gaudreau in Columbus and as teammates representing the United States at the world hockey championships in the Czech Republic in May.

“He was one of the biggest mentors for me at the world championships,” Brindley said. “I couldn’t tell you how many times we hung out with Meredith, pictures on my phone. It’s just so hard to look back and see that kind of stuff.”

The NHL and NHL Players’ Association are providing the Blue Jackets help in the form of grief counseling, crowd security at vigils and addressing hockey issues, such as potentially altering the league’s salary cap rules to provide Columbus relief from having to reach the NHL minimum payroll because of the void left by Gaudreau’s contract.

“The Blue Jackets, I don’t think anybody’s focused from an organizational standpoint, from a hockey standpoint as to what comes next, because I think everybody’s still in shock,” NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman told The Associated Press last week. “I don’t think anybody’s focused right now other than on the grieving part, which is understandable.”

Much of the burden has fallen to Waddell, who has been in discussions with the NHL and the NHLPA and dealing with outreach programs with the Blue Jackets’ partner OhioHealth, while also overseeing preparations for training camp and gauging his prospects in Buffalo.

There’s also his roster to attend to, which he said has two openings at forward, one involving Justin Danforth, who may miss the start of the season because of a wrist injury. Waddell didn’t have to mention the second opening.

Tiring and emotional as it’s been, Waddell found comfort being in his element, a rink, and looking ahead to the start of training camp.

“The guys are in really good shape. We’ve done a lot of testing already and they’re eager to get going,” Waddell said. “We have a reason to play for. And we’ll make the best of it.”

The Blue Jackets later Sunday signed veteran winger James van Riemsdyk to a one-year contract worth $900,000.

“James van Riemsdyk has been a very consistent, productive player throughout his career,” Waddell said. “Bringing him to Columbus will not only provide depth to our group up front, but also valuable leadership and another veteran presence in our dressing room.”

___

AP Hockey Writer Stephen Whyno in New York contributed to this report.

___

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PSG says defender Nuno Mendes target of racial abuse after a French league game

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37 mins ago

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September 16, 2024

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PARIS (AP) — Paris Saint-Germain defender Nuno Mendes was the target of abusive and racist comments on social media after a French league game.

The club condemned the abuse and expressed its “full support” Sunday for the Portugal left back, who was targeted following PSG’s 3-1 win against Brest on Saturday.

Mendes, who is Black, shared on his Instagram account a racist message he received.

During the match, Mendes brought down Ludovic Ajorque in the box for a penalty that Romain Del Castillo converted to give Brest the lead.

“Paris Saint-Germain doesn’t tolerate racism, antisemitism or any other form of discrimination,” the club said. “The racial insults directed at Nuno Mendes are totally unacceptable … we are working with the relevant authorities and associations to ensure those responsible are held accountable for their actions.”

___

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Slovenia’s Tadej Pogacar wins Grand Prix Cycliste de Montreal

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38 mins ago

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September 16, 2024

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MONTREAL – Tadej Pogacar was so dominant on Sunday, Canada’s Michael Woods called it a race for second.

Pogacar, a three-time Tour de France champion from Slovenia, pedalled to a resounding victory at the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montreal.

The UAE Team Emirates leader crossed the finish line 24 seconds ahead of Spain’s Pello Bilbao of Bahrain — Victorious to win the demanding 209.1-kilometre race on a sunny, 28 C day in Montreal. France’s Julian Alaphilippe of Soudal Quick-Step was third.

“He’s the greatest rider of all time, he’s a formidable opponent,” said Woods, who finished 45 seconds behind the leader in eighth. “If you’re not at your very, very best, then you can forget racing with him, and today was kind of representative of that.

“He’s at such a different level that if you follow him, it can be lights out.”

Pogacar slowed down before the last turn to celebrate with the crowd, high-five fans on Avenue du Parc and cruise past the finish line with his arms in the air after more than five hours on the bike.

The 25-year-old joined Belgium’s Greg Van Avermaet as the only multi-time winners in Montreal after claiming the race in 2022. He also redeemed a seventh-place finish at the Quebec City Grand Prix on Friday.

“I was disappointed, because I had such good legs that I didn’t do better than seventh,” Pogacar said. “To bounce back after seventh to victory here, it’s just an incredible feeling.”

It’s Pogacar’s latest win in a dominant year that includes victories at the Tour de France and Giro d’Italia.

Ottawa’s Woods (Israel Premier-Tech) tied a career-best in front of the home crowd in Montreal, but hoped for more after claiming a stage at the Spanish Vuelta two weeks ago.

“I wanted a better result,” the 37-year-old rider said. “My goal was a podium, but at the same time I’m happy with the performance. In bike racing, you can’t always get the result you want and I felt like I raced really well, I animated the race, I felt like I was up there.”

Pogacar completed the 17 climbs up and down Mount Royal near downtown in five hours 28 minutes 15 seconds.

He made his move with 23.3 kilometres to go, leaving the peloton in his dust as he pedalled into the lead — one he never relinquished.

Bilbao, Alaphilippe, Alex Aranburu (Movistar Team) and Bart Lemmen (Visma–Lease) chased in a group behind him, with Bilbao ultimately separating himself from the pack. But he never came close to catching Pogacar, who built a 35-second lead with one lap left to go.

“It was still a really hard race today, but the team was on point,” Pogacar said. “We did really how we planned, and the race situation was good for us. We make it hard in the last final laps, and they set me up for a (takeover) two laps to go, and it was all perfect.”

Ottawa’s Derek Gee, who placed ninth in this year’s Tour de France, finished 48th in Montreal, and called it a “hard day” in the heat.

“I think everyone knows when you see Tadej on the start line that it’s just going to be full gas,” Gee said.

Israel Premier-Tech teammate Hugo Houle of Sainte-Perpétue, Que., was 51st.

Houle said he heard Pogacar inform his teammates on the radio that he was ready to attack with two laps left in the race.

“I said then, well, clearly it’s over for me,” Houle said. “You see, cycling isn’t that complicated.”

Australia’s Michael Matthews won the Quebec City GP for a record third time on Friday, but did not finish in Montreal. The two races are the only North American events on the UCI World Tour.

Michael Leonard of Oakville, Ont., and Gil Gelders and Dries De Bondt of Belgium broke away from the peloton during the second lap. Leonard led the majority of the race before losing pace with 45 kilometres to go.

Only 89 of 169 riders from 24 teams — including the Canadian national team — completed the gruelling race that features 4,573 metres in total altitude.

Next up, the riders will head to the world championships in Zurich, Switzerland from Sept. 21 to 29.

Pogacar will try to join Eddy Merckx (1974) and Stephen Roche (1987) as the only men to win three major titles in a season — known as the Triple Crown.

“Today gave me a lot of confidence, motivation,” Pogacar said. “I think we are ready for world championships.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 15, 2024.



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