The idea would be to impose aggressive restrictions as soon as the number of cases starts to increase, instead of waiting for the health system to be under pressure, explains the medical microbiologist at St-Boniface Hospital in Winnipeg, Philippe Lagacé. -Wiens.
He is one of 28 doctors and researchers to have signed an open letter in the magazine Maclean’s, asking Ottawa and the provincial governments to be more proactive and tough in their approach.
This strategy has proved its worth in the Atlantic bubble, in Australia and Taiwan, underlines Dr Lagacé-Wiens.
These restrictions will be more aggressive, but will remain in place for a shorter time, he assures, well aware of a certain fatigue of the population concerning these sanitary measures.
Dr. Lagacé-Wiens takes the example of the strict confinement imposed on Manitoba in March 2020, at the start of the pandemic, when few cases had been declared in the province. The bottom line is that there were no cases.
The first wave, we did not have in Manitoba. This is probably because we took very aggressive measures from the start.
He nevertheless qualifies the current confinement in the province of half half, with measures still allowing members of different households to congregate on restaurant terraces.
It is certain that there was transmission. Converting that to very firm containment will have a huge impact, but people are going to take it as a very long duration, but that’s because we started with a half-way effort, let’s say.
Dr. Anand Kumar is one of 10 Manitobans to sign the open letter.
This removal strategy involves tightening border restrictions, shutting down non-essential businesses, limiting gatherings, and continuing vaccination efforts, says Winnipeg intensive care physician and infectious disease specialist Anand Kumar.
Also a signatory of the letter, he considers that these measures can be relaxed when each province is able to control its young. bush fires with local measures, rather than continuing these endless half-action roller coaster.
Not safe from a fourth wave?
Dr Kumar fears that provincial governments will loosen existing health restrictions as soon as hospitals are no longer under pressure, which would be a mistake, according to him.
Dr Kumar warns Canadians of the possibility of a fourth wave, despite vaccination efforts. It takes several weeks for the immune response to occur after the vaccine, he explains. According to him, the best way to compensate for the increase in the number of cases is to limit social interactions.
I’m tired, everyone who works in intensive care is exhausted.
We think we are starting to get out of it, but we can always have a surprise, adds Dr Lagacé-Wiens. This virus could reappear, especially if you have a variant that is transmitted among the [personnes] immune.
This pandemic is said to be a once-in-a-generation event, but we may have more, adds Dr Lagacé-Wiens. He stresses the importance of producing reference documents, with strategies that work.
Maximum suppression strategy works for all pandemics.
