COVID-19 in B.C.: How to track cases in the Omicron wave
For much of this pandemic, tracking daily COVID-19 numbers was a tool for health officials and the public to understand how the coronavirus was affecting our communities.
Now that Omicron cases have exploded in British Columbia and jurisdictions across the world, the daily case count is no longer a viable source.
“We’re flying blind, with respect to the numbers of cases in the province,” said Dr. Sally Otto, a member of the independent BC COVID-19 Modelling Group. Otto is also Canada’s research chair in theoretical and experimental evolution at the University of British Columbia.
The latest numbers from the province on Friday showed there are currently 33,184 active, lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 in B.C., an all-time high since the pandemic began.
According to the latest report from the modelling group, the active number of cases is likely around 250,000.
“I would suspect that five per cent of the population is actively infected with Omicron right now in B.C.,” said Otto.
Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry urged British Columbians at a news conference on Dec. 24 to only go to a testing centre if they have symptoms, as the province has reached its capacity for conducting PCR tests.
B.C. is prioritizing those tests for people at greater risk of complications from the virus, specifically those over age 65, those with weakened immune symptoms and people experiencing severe symptoms.
PCR tests are also being reserved for frontline health-care workers, who must have certainty that their symptoms are not COVID-19 in order to continue working in B.C.’s stretched health-care system.
“The reason we are only seeing 3,000, 4,000 cases reported a day is because we’ve capped the number of people we are testing,” said Otto.
The BC COVID-19 Modelling Group has been forced to look for alternative sources of information to track the number of infections in the province, which Otto says is important for people to know.
“It matters that we have a sense of those numbers because what you do in your daily life, the risks you take, depend a lot on the number of cases in your community,” said Otto.
Otto and her team are starting to track wastewater in the Lower Mainland again. Wastewater can be an early warning signal for COVID-19 in a community and fill the gaps when testing is over capacity.
“It helps us know when we are peaking and when the virus count is coming down,” said Otto.
Otto is also asking business owners or managers who have staff off work because of COVID-19 to reach out to her team.
“If you are running a business and have information about the number of staff on sick leave, send the data our way,” she said. “We can use information like that to say, ‘Here is the burden of disease across the month of January.’”
Health experts tell CTV News the good news about the Omicron wave is that the curve will trend down as quickly as it has gone up. Otto expects the province will be able to give a PCR test to anyone feeling symptoms again by February.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Liberal MP says she's leaving politics over disrespectful dialogue, threats, misogyny
Liberal MP Pam Damoff says she won't run again in the next federal election, saying she has experienced misogyny, disrespectful dialogue in politics and threats to her life.
Concerns about Plexiglass prompt inspections at some Loblaws locations in Ottawa
Inspections are underway at more than one Loblaws location in Ottawa after complaints were filed about tall Plexiglass barriers.
Federal employees will be required to spend 3 days a week in the office
Starting in September, public servants in the core public administration will be required to work in the office a minimum of three days a week. The Treasury Board Secretariat says executives will need to be in the office four days per week.
OPP officer said 'someone's going to get hurt' before wrong-way Hwy. 401 crash
As multiple Durham police cruisers were chasing a robbery suspect on the wrong side of Highway 401 Monday night, an Ontario Provincial Police officer shared his concerns, telling a dispatcher, "Someone's going to get hurt."
Ont. woman who faked pregnancy to defraud doulas arrested again on similar charges
Victims of a Brantford, Ont., woman who was sentenced to house arrest earlier this year for defrauding and deceiving doulas say they’re not surprised she’s been apprehended again on similar charges.
Five human skeletons, missing hands and feet, found outside house of Nazi leader Hermann Göring
Archeologists have unearthed the skeletons of five people, missing their hands and feet, at a former Nazi military base in Poland.
Poilievre returns to House unrepentant for calling Trudeau 'wacko,' Speaker not resigning
An unrepentant Pierre Poilievre returned to the House of Commons on Wednesday to pepper the prime minister about his drug decriminalization policies after being booted the day prior for refusing to take back calling Justin Trudeau 'wacko' over his approach to the issue.
Construction begins on LGBTQ2S+ national monument in Ottawa
Shovels have hit the ground for constuction on Canada's LGBTQ2S+ national monument in Ottawa.
B.C. man awarded $5,000 in damages in first-of-it-kind intimate image case
In a first-of-its-kind case, a B.C. tribunal has ruled on a dispute involving the non-consensual sharing of intimate images, awarding damages and issuing orders that the photos be destroyed and taken offline.