Over the span of final week, Southlake Regional Well being Centre noticed the variety of sufferers admitted to hospital improve from 20 to greater than 60, resulting in an alarm bell being sounded for medical doctors and nurses on the frontlines.
Final Thursday, Southlake mentioned the unfold of the Omicron variant was “in contrast to something we now have encountered within the pandemic to this point” and warned they proceed to see “vital numbers” of hospital employees check constructive or require day without work attributable to publicity to COVID-19.
“Primarily based on Provincial directives and the necessity to protect hospital capability and scale back the unfold of the virus, Southlake has needed to make a collection of adverse selections,” mentioned the hospital. “With circumstances and hospitalizations rising at an alarming tempo, all hospitals in Ontario have been directed to cancel chosen surgical procedures to be able to improve mattress capability and unlock employees to be redeployed. Southlake is following this directive and employees from our surgical program have already began to look after sufferers in different areas of the hospital.
“Staffing has develop into a major problem and we're doing all the pieces we will to mitigate this. Healthcare employees are actually extra impacted by the elevated unfold of COVID-19 locally than ever earlier than. This, mixed with the elevated variety of sufferers within the hospital with COVID-19, continues to place strain on our groups. Much like earlier waves, we now have began to redeploy employees into totally different areas of the hospital primarily based on affected person want. Our superb employees and physicians are the guts and soul of Southlake. Their dedication, tenacity and compassion has been a relentless supply of inspiration all through the pandemic.”
The battle confronted by hospitals like Southlake in response to the Omicron variant was tackled at the beginning of the week by Dr. Barry Pakes, York Area’s Medical Officer of Well being.
The cancellation of some surgical procedures, he mentioned, together with the closure of faculties till a minimum of January 17, are “designed to maintain the burden on the healthcare system to a minimal.”
“We perceive how irritating the return to those restrictions might be, however we now have seen from expertise they will actually make a distinction and hopefully this time they are going to be extra short-lived,” mentioned Dr. Pakes.
Folks may really feel, he added, that the battle towards COVID-19 is “shifting backward reasonably than ahead,” however mentioned there are nonetheless “excellent news tales” popping out of the native battle, together with York Area’s determination to carry the boundaries on boosters by way of the native well being unit and increasing eligibility to residents between the ages of 18 and 49. There may be additionally a brand new precedence for training employees getting their boosters.
“Ontario knowledge means that vaccine effectiveness with a booster towards an infection continues to be within the 30 – 40 per cent vary with Pfizer and near 60 per cent with Moderna,” he mentioned. “Extra importantly, safety towards hospitalization and extreme sickness is within the 70 – 80 per cent vary. The booster can actually make a distinction for every of us and for our healthcare system.
“For these small variety of York Area residents who're nonetheless unvaccinated, I've a particular message and a particular plea: whereas infections are occurring in vaccinated and unvaccinated alike, the hospitalization, ICU admissions and deaths are largely within the unvaccinated. That is true in Ontario and the world over.”
Vaccines may also be integral, he added, in ensuring there's a return to high school sooner reasonably than later, underscoring the worth of in-person studying to college students’ psychological and bodily wellbeing.
York Area Public Well being is “advocating a return to in-person studying and persevering with to have interaction with faculties and the Province to assist this.”
“An important factor you are able to do to get college students again to sustained in-person studying is to get your youngster vaccinated,” he concluded. “Over half of York Area youngsters are vaccinated and with out larger protection, we would proceed to see sadly excessive numbers of kids visiting emergency rooms and being admitted.”