TORONTO —
With new cases of COVID-19 variants being confirmed across Canada, some experts say achieving herd immunity is no longer possible, or may require a much higher percentage of the population being vaccinated than previously thought.
Experts say herd immunity is achieved when most of a country’s population — estimates vary from 60 to 80 per cent — have acquired defences against a virus, whether through vaccination or because they caught the disease and survived.
The specific percentage threshold hasn’t been settled on in Canada, but Health Canada’s chief medical adviser Dr. Supriya Sharma previously told the House of Commons health committee that vaccination rates will likely have to be even higher than the popular estimates to ensure those who cannot get vaccinated are protected.
“Now with the emergence of variants and because they are more transmissible, I think a lot of people are adjusting those numbers up towards more like 85 per cent, or even potentially 90 per cent coverage to achieve herd immunity,” Sharma said.
“Certainly it’s a moving target, because as we know, the virus and its transmissibility and how contagious it is, is changing,” she added.
Jeff Kwong, an epidemiologist with the Sunnybrook Research Institute in Toronto, told CTVNews.ca on Thursday that reaching herd immunity in Canada is still possible, but “what level of immunity needed to achieve that is uncertain.”
“With the new variants being more transmissible, we will likely need higher levels of immunity in the population to have herd immunity,” Kwong said in an email.
He estimates that the immunity threshold would likely be somewhere around 80 per cent of the population being vaccinated.
Canada has reached herd immunity before against other diseases, such as the measles. However, experts aren’t so sure the same will happen with the novel coronavirus.
Eleanor Fish, a senior immunologist with the Toronto-based University Health Network, says there are a variety factors impacting herd immunity beyond just vaccination rates, including asymptomatic transmission, the extended time between vaccine doses, and the level of protection Canadians previously infected with COVID-19 have against new variants.
“So guestimating herd immunity with all these moving parts — it’s nigh on impossible from my perspective,” Fish said in an email.
Dr. Anna Banerji, an infectious disease expert and the director of global and Indigenous health at the University of Toronto, says achieving herd immunity is no longer possible because Canada isn’ vaccinating all of its residents
She explained in a telephone interview on Thursday that Canada is not currently vaccinating children, leaving out a major portion of the entire population.
“To have herd immunity, you have to have a large percentage of the population vaccinated, and that includes the whole population — anyone susceptible to COVID — so that includes children,” Banerji said.
“As long as you have children not vaccinated, the virus can go to children, it can spread through them, they can act as a reservoir to come back and infect people,” she added.
While herd immunity may still seem like an achievable goal to some, Banerji said the focus should be on vaccinating as many Canadians as possible.
“Whoever gets the vaccine has a much, much reduced risk of getting COVID, but also a greatly reduced risk of getting severely sick from COVID, ending up in the hospital and dying from it. For each individual that gets vaccinated, that reduces the risk of them getting it, but also the people around them,” Banerji said.
She added that ramping up vaccinations will also subsequently limit the spread of more contagious variants.
“If there are a lot of people with COVID and a lot of virus out there, then it’s more likely that the virus is going to mutate, but if people are mostly vaccinated, then it slows down the mutation,” Banerji explained.
WHAT HAPPENS IF HERD IMMUNITY IS ACHIEVED?
Even if herd immunity is achieved, Deputy Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Howard Njoo has said that the easing of public health restrictions won’t immediately happen.
He said returning to normal will depend on more than the percentage of people who are vaccinated, including the number of hospitalizations and the number of variant cases across the country.
“At this point, no one knows how many people need to be vaccinated, you know, what might be the sufficient level of vaccine coverage to get herd immunity, so that’s why I think we can’t just rely on vaccination,” Njoo said.
Public health officials have signalled that even when vaccines become widespread, there will need to be precautionary measures like frequent hand-washing, physical distancing and mask-wearing in place for some time.
“I don’t think we’ll ever get back to what normal was, you know, pre-COVID, I think it’d be a different kind of what normal is,” said Njoo.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A linebacker at Division II West Virginia State was fatally shot during what the university said Thursday is being investigated by police as a home invasion.
The body of Jyilek Zyiare Harrington, 21, of Charlotte, North Carolina, was found inside an apartment Wednesday night in Charleston, police Lt. Tony Hazelett said in a statement.
Hazelett said several gunshots were fired during a disturbance in a hallway and inside the apartment. The statement said Harrington had multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene. Police said they had no information on a possible suspect.
West Virginia State said counselors were available to students and faculty on campus.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with Jyilek’s family as they mourn the loss of this incredible young man,” West Virginia State President Ericke S. Cage said in a letter to students and faculty.
Harrington, a senior, had eight total tackles, including a sack, in a 27-24 win at Barton College last week.
“Jyilek truly embodied what it means to be a student-athlete and was a leader not only on campus but in the community,” West Virginia State Vice President of Intercollegiate Athletics Nate Burton said. “Jyilek was a young man that, during Christmas, would create a GoFundMe to help less fortunate families.”
Burton said donations to a fund established by the athletic department in Harrington’s memory will be distributed to an organization in Charlotte to continue his charity work.
West Virginia State’s home opener against Carson-Newman, originally scheduled for Thursday night, has been rescheduled to Friday, and a private vigil involving both teams was set for Thursday night. Harrington previously attended Carson-Newman, where he made seven tackles in six games last season. He began his college career at Division II Erskine College.
“Carson-Newman joins West Virginia State in mourning the untimely passing of former student-athlete Jyilek Harrington,” Carson-Newman Vice President of Athletics Matt Pope said in a statement. “The Harrington family and the Yellow Jackets’ campus community is in our prayers. News like this is sad to hear anytime, but today it feels worse with two teams who knew him coming together to play.”
DETROIT (AP) — Joe Schmidt, the Hall of Fame linebacker who helped the Detroit Lions win NFL championships in 1953 and 1957 and later coached the team, has died. He was 92.
The Lions said family informed the team Schmidt died Wednesday. A cause of death was not provided.
One of pro football’s first great middle linebackers, Schmidt played his entire NFL career with the Lions from 1953-65. An eight-time All-Pro, he was enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1973 and the college football version in 2000.
“Joe likes to say that at one point in his career, he was 6-3, but he had tackled so many fullbacks that it drove his neck into his shoulders and now he is 6-foot,” said the late Lions owner William Clay Ford, Schmidt’s presenter at his Hall of Fame induction in 1973. “At any rate, he was listed at 6-feet and as I say was marginal for that position. There are, however, qualities that certainly scouts or anybody who is drafting a ballplayer cannot measure.”
Born in Pittsburgh, Schmidt played college football in his hometown at Pitt, beginning his stint there as a fullback and guard before coach Len Casanova switched him to linebacker.
“Pitt provided me with the opportunity to do what I’ve wanted to do, and further myself through my athletic abilities,” Schmidt said. “Everything I have stemmed from that opportunity.”
Schmidt dealt with injuries throughout his college career and was drafted by the Lions in the seventh round in 1953. As defenses evolved in that era, Schmidt’s speed, savvy and tackling ability made him a valuable part of some of the franchise’s greatest teams.
Schmidt was elected to the Pro Bowl 10 straight years from 1955-64, and after his arrival, the Lions won the last two of their three NFL titles in the 1950s.
In a 1957 playoff game at San Francisco, the Lions trailed 27-7 in the third quarter before rallying to win 31-27. That was the NFL’s largest comeback in postseason history until Buffalo rallied from a 32-point deficit to beat Houston in 1993.
“We just decided to go after them, blitz them almost every down,” Schmidt recalled. “We had nothing to lose. When you’re up against it, you let both barrels fly.”
Schmidt became an assistant coach after wrapping up his career as a player. He was Detroit’s head coach from 1967-72, going 43-35-7.
Schmidt was part of the NFL’s All-Time Team revealed in 2019 to celebrate the league’s centennial season. Of course, he’d gone into the Hall of Fame 46 years earlier.
Not bad for an undersized seventh-round draft pick.
“It was a dream of mine to play football,” Schmidt told the Detroit Free Press in 2017. “I had so many people tell me that I was too small. That I couldn’t play. I had so many negative people say negative things about me … that it makes you feel good inside. I said, ‘OK, I’ll prove it to you.’”
VICTORIA – British Columbia‘s Environment Assessment Office has fined Coastal GasLink Pipeline Ltd. $590,000 for “deficiencies” in the construction of its pipeline crossing the province.
The office says in a statement that 10 administrative penalties have been levied against the company for non-compliance with requirements of its environmental assessment certificate.
It says the fines come after problems with erosion and sediment control measures were identified by enforcement officers along the pipeline route across northern B.C. in April and May 2023.
The office says that the latest financial penalties reflect its escalation of enforcement due to repeated non-compliance of its requirements.
Four previous penalties have been issued for failing to control erosion and sediment valued at almost $800,000, while a fifth fine of $6,000 was handed out for providing false or misleading information.
The office says it prioritized its inspections along the 670-kilometre route by air and ground as a result of the continued concerns, leading to 59 warnings and 13 stop-work orders along the pipeline that has now been completed.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
