British Columbia now looks to be a victim of its own success in fighting COVID‑19.
The initial campaign to suppress the spread was so successful it left the impression the pandemic could be beaten.
It can’t.
It’s a highly-contagious virus that spread all over the world in a few short weeks. It’s persistent, sneaky and relentless. Without a vaccine, the idea of eradicating such a virulent plague is a lost cause.
The best to be hoped for is that the infection rate can be managed to stay below the limits of health resources. That was the thrust from the beginning of the message to bend the curve.
No one ever promised to drive the curve down to zero. But it flat-lined for so long it looks like people started assuming the crisis was over and B.C. could carry on indefinitely with a paltry handful of new cases a day.
So there’s consternation since the case count started escalating in July, to the point where it bounced back to near record highs this week. There were 84 new cases Friday, the third day in a row that has matched the sky-high levels in March.
The saving grace is that the profile of the pandemic seems to have changed. Far greater numbers of younger people are testing positive comparatively, and they don’t get as sick.
So the hospitalization rate—12 patients as of Friday—remains far below the level that would send the health care system to condition red.
Twenty-somethings are getting it at twice the rate they were in the spring and that age group now has the largest number of cases. The renewed concern about the case count has prompted some calls to restore the restrictions that were imposed in the spring and relaxed in two phases through May and June.
But the increase in cases was expected when the re-start of the economy began. It’s literally the cost of doing business.
“No surprise,” provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said this week. “As we knew, as we started to increase and open up and move into our restart phases, we were going to see more cases.”
The modeling shows that slamming more restrictions back in place would curb the caseload. But the government intends to resist any thought of renewing restrictions, unless it becomes unavoidable. The economic destruction and resulting job loss looks to have reached the point where government sees returning to more stringent restrictions as a last-ditch option.
Another reason lies in the new analyses this week confirming the obvious: Lower socio-economic groups are having a harder time coping.
While Henry manages the epidemiology, politicians are dealing with demands for hundreds of millions of dollars more in aid and reports of thousands of businesses closing.
Premier John Horgan spent Friday in a sometimes-testy debate with Opposition Leader Andrew Wilkinson on the government’s economic response.
Wilkinson highlighted unemployment statistics, business closures and the upcoming deadlines to pay billions in taxes that were deferred earlier in the year. Horgan said the official economic response plan—worth $1.5 billion—is due to be released in early September. The government plans to be as flexible as possible with companies that can’t pay taxes at the end of September, he said.
The reluctance to clamp down again and the determination to open schools suggests B.C. is nearing the limits of assistance. The emphasis will be on reacting to new cases under current protocols, with tactics like 500 new contract tracers soon to be hired.
Henry said that will “ensure that we can continue with our restart.” They’ll do so in the face of modeling that predicts “the number of new cases may continue to increase this summer.”
The escalation stems from something that’s always been a given, but never been made clearer. It’s the innate human need to socialize. People can close themselves off from contact for a brief period of time, but then they have to go out and mingle with others. The pandemic has revealed the strength of that drive, even when it’s foolhardy and potentially lethal to do so. It’s another reason why going back to stricter limits is being resisted.
What if people just ignore them?
