In early April, Canada’s public health agency first released estimates of how widely the novel coronavirus might spread in the country and how many people might die as a result.
Those projections, released on April 9, predicted that COVID-19 could take between 11,000 and 22,000 Canadian lives over the course of the pandemic, if strong public health controls were implemented. The agency also offered worse estimates for scenarios involving weaker epidemic controls, or none at all.
Nearly four months later, the deaths of about 9,000 people have been linked to the virus in Canada — but the pandemic is far from over, according to the World Health Organization.
How did those initial forecasts influence Canadians’ behaviour — if at all — and how do they hold up today? Here’s what experts have to say.
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How Canada responded
The April 9 estimates showed that weak to no controls during the pandemic could see anywhere from 25 per cent to 80 per cent of the population infected and between 100,000 and 350,000 deaths — a startling difference from the approximately 500 deaths reported at that time.
“I think [the projections] did scare people, at least helped people understand the extent of what we were talking about,” said Ashleigh Tuite, an infectious disease epidemiologist and mathematical modeler at the University of Toronto.
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Nicholas King, an associate professor at McGill University who researches public health ethics and policy, said his impression is that the first modelling numbers likely served as a wake-up call for Canadians and decision-markers.
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“I think it’s likely that that helped convince policymakers of the necessity to act, and act earlier than a lot of other jurisdictions,” King said.
Tuite argued that the lockdown and distancing measures that Canadians imposed and followed in the following months “did have a huge effect.” She pointed to early results of an analysis of 10,000 blood donor samples that suggested less than one of per cent had been infected with the virus.
Those early projections were based on the case data available in Canada at the time, as well as the knowledge experts had about how the virus behaves, Dr. Theresa Tam, the country’s chief public health officer, said on April 9.
Four months into the pandemic, Tuite said those projections could still be “relevant” today. But she said the long-term estimates for deaths and cases might be “overly optimistic” if there are resurgences of the virus and continued outbreaks across the country.
King agreed, arguing we’re likely only in the middle of the pandemic right now.
“It may be that this turns into something that looks a lot more like influenza or some other viruses that become endemic and stay with us for a long time — in which case, the projection of 11,000 to 22,000 (deaths) for the pandemic is likely to be an underestimate,” he said.
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“I think it’s really hard to assess those things just because we have no idea what the end date for the pandemic is going to be.”
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It could go the other way, however. How much more the total death count grows ultimately depends on the overall case count and what population gets infected, said Caroline Colijn, an infectious disease modeler and mathematics professor at Simon Fraser University.
“We might expect to see fewer deaths per number of reported cases if our cases are landing predominantly in younger people — which is starting to happen because of more community wide-transmission — as opposed to hospital or long-term care outbreaks where people are more vulnerable.”
While nearly 200 COVID-19 deaths were linked to long-term care homes by April 9, Tuite says she doesn’t believe the initial forecasts reflected the scale of the spread in seniors’ home.
“I don’t think the extent of it was known,” she said. “I know that most of the models that were developed didn’t incorporate the outbreaks in long-term care homes.”
Will PHAC release updated long-term estimates?
Since early April, the Public Health Agency of Canada has released four sets of short-term projections for COVID-19 case numbers and deaths — which for the most part, have proven to be accurate.
With a second wave of the virus expected this fall, Global News asked PHAC if it would release another set of long-term COVID-19 projections.
“As we learn more about the virus, we update our models accordingly. A future presentation will be announced close to the date,” a statement from the agency said.
Experts say the pandemic’s course rests largely on peoples’ actions and behaviour. While those things are challenging to predict — and the COVID-19 situation varies by province — Coljin said she does think there’s a case for having “a national-level picture and federal-level communication over what’s going to be necessary.”
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She said officials can make national long-term forecasts “based on what behaviours and level of control we have now.”
“Those forecasts are always kind of thought-experiments for what could happen and I think they can help guide us in making decisions on what to do,” she said.
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
