It is this Monday that the reductions in health measures recently announced by Public Health and the Government of Quebec come into force. Six weeks before the big holiday gatherings, and while cases are on the rise, COVID-STOP experts are worried about the consequences of these reductions, in a context where families need to be together more than ever. at Christmas.
It seems absurd to us to open the floodgates now, whereas on the contrary, we must put all the chances on our side so that the grandparents are not again kept at a distance from their grandchildren.
To do this, it is urgent to recognize the main mode of transmission of COVID-19: aerosols. Until the highest public health authorities officially recognize this transmission vector, decisions about how to alleviate certain health measures will remain risky and will continue to promote significant circulation of the virus.
The collective therefore reiterates a concern expressed many times over the past year: it is urgent that the ventilation of indoor environments and air filtration be integrated into the arsenal of health measures in force to reduce the risk of transmission of the disease. virus.
Focusing only on vaccination and removing the obligation to wear a mask in many places – poorly ventilated indoor spaces – where hundreds of people live together, is certainly accepting that many people are infected and that there are outbreaks of disease. major outbreaks develop.
At a press conference on November 2, Dr Horacio Arruda said he expected an increase in cases in connection with the recent reductions in health measures. He also compared COVID-19 to the flu, indicating that we should now learn to live with this virus as we live with the seasonal flu. We take issue with this orientation which trivializes the highly contagious, but also immeasurably more dangerous nature of COVID-19 and its variants: seasonal flu does not produce the excess mortality that we witnessed last year and it does not many young people in excellent health do not lead to intensive care; the flu does not handicap thousands of adults and children in the long term, who will continue to struggle with the major sequelae of the disease (long-term COVID).
It seems surprising to us to say the least that such declarations come from the highest public health authorities, when many of us have spent long months trying to explain the dangerousness of COVID-19 and have done everything. to deconstruct the lame analogy with other seasonal respiratory viruses. It seems just as harmful to us to hear, once again, the director of public health and the Minister of Health explain to us that the reductions in health measures are decided on the basis of the availability of beds in a hospital environment. These guidelines do not take into account the fact that the delays accumulated in recent months in terms of urgent interventions are far from having been absorbed, that the workers are exhausted and no longer sufficient for the task, that the children under 12 years old and immunosuppressed people are not adequately protected by vaccination and that the protection conferred by vaccines tends to decrease significantly in the general population, many Quebecers having been vaccinated more than six years ago. month.
The World Health Organization has also recently launched a cry of alarm, in view of the very worrying situation in Europe: it is necessary, according to it, to maintain the obligation to wear a mask and ensure maximum ventilation of spaces. interiors to avoid another significant wave of mortality. The Minister of Health of Quebec was moreover concerned, last week, by what is happening in Europe in countries whose vaccination rates are comparable to ours. We agree with his concerns: since the start of the pandemic, what has been observed across the Atlantic has inevitably ended up here; let us take note of this and use the chance we have to benefit from a few weeks of delay to make informed decisions here.
No one wants to relive the traumatic Christmas of last year: the reunion at a distance, by interposed screens, and the health staff at the end of their rope, forced to sacrifice family meals to take care of the many patients flocking to the emergency room. . Let us hope to experience something else this year and give ourselves all the means to achieve it!
* The authors sign on behalf of the COVID-STOP collective.
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