Canada’s coronavirus case-tracing app, COVID Alert, has seen a slight resurgence in popularity with the wave of Omicron. The number of cases reported in this federal government tool increased more than tenfold in a month in December. These entries, however, remained tiny compared to the total number of infections recorded in the country.
The Omicron variant was declared of concern by the World Health Organization on November 26. Two days later, he made his appearance in Canada.
In the week of December 1-7, 402 cases of COVID-19 were listed in COVID Alert. These entries then began to increase over the weeks. Between December 21 and 28, this figure reached 5,522 new cases. Then, between December 29 and January 5, 5,424 app users registered to have COVID-19, according to data obtained by The duty with the Public Health Agency of Canada.
In December alone, 12,252 codes were entered into COVID Alert. Users use these single-use keys to anonymously report their positive diagnosis, which then allows them to alert people who have been in their vicinity in the previous fourteen days. By way of comparison, only 559 codes had been entered into the application in August.
However, even if the followers of Alerte COVID duly registered their infection in the application, the number of entries remains negligible.
Because although approximately 5,500 cases were reported through the application for each of the two weeks of the holiday season, 25,330 new cases were reported on average each day in the country between December 23 and 29. . The following week, Canada had about 41,740 daily new cases — the seven-day equivalent of 53 times the 5,424 cases listed for the same week in COVID Alert.
Less than 0.02% of cases listed
The application developed by the federal government at the start of the pandemic has never benefited from the hoped-for membership rate. Justin Trudeau said he hoped, in the summer of 2020, that at least 50% of the population would take advantage of it. British researchers had established at the time that this kind of application is only effective if the adhesion rate is 60% or more.
Eighteen months later, 6.8 million Canadians have downloaded COVID Alert.
Statistics Canada estimated in 2018 that 88% of Canadians aged 15 and over own a smartphone. On a population in these age groups estimated at 32.2 million people, for 2021, this would represent 28.3 million Canadians who could have downloaded the application.
Since the launch of COVID Alert in July 2020, just over 56,900 single-use keys have been entered — or 0.019% of the cases identified in the country. Canada is now approaching three million cases of coronavirus since the start of the pandemic.
Last July, The Canadian Press reported that the federal government spent nearly $20 million to develop its tracing application adopted by the majority of provinces — 15.9 million to promote COVID Alert and 3.5 million for the development and application maintenance.
The Trudeau government has hardly been promoting it for months. The last update of the dashboard of the application, on the federal website, dates from January 1st. That of the Quebec government site presenting the application and the links to download it dates back to June.