Proof of previous infection may be also considered in these policies. This may vary based on the risk to your demographic. This could mean a policy already in use for health-care workers and the influenza vaccine: You don’t neccesarily have to be vaccinated, but if there are cases at work or at school, you and your child will be asked to stay home for your own protection. So where do we go from here? I think we will end on a middle ground for a potentially endemic virus. And, as we saw with the “mild” Omicron wave, this triggers a lockdown which affects all of us. Individuals getting seriously ill place strains on hospitals, health-care workers and have spillover effects, including the cancellation of medical procedures. Unfortunately, our fragile health-care system complicates this decision. People not wishing to be vaccinated could argue that an unvaccinated person was no more likely to become infected by Omicron than a two-dose vaccinated person. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Graham HughesĪnd here is where it gets complicated. However, if the goal is to protect against serious illness then two doses provided reasonable protection, although this would be improved with a booster.Ī customer has their proof of vaccination scanned entering a restaurant in Montréal in September, 2021. If the goal was to prevent transmission to others, any mandate should be three vaccines which provide 60-70 per cent protection against infection. Herd immunity through vaccination alone was unattainable. The rationale for vaccine passports was now different. But more importantly, two doses of vaccine provided minimal protection against infection, although it did protect against serious illness and death. The Omicron wave changed the story again. However, the broader application of the policy also resulted in increased vaccination rates, and helped control the Delta wave. In my mind, you simply could not allow individuals to go to these high-risk settings unvaccinated. During the Delta wave, stories of vulnerable essential workers contracting the virus in warehouses and meat packing plants and spreading it to their families who fell seriously ill, were terrible. ![]() ![]() When a federal election was called, this was a key platform issue of the Liberal party.Īs a physician innovator in digital immunization records with expertise in health law, policy and ethics, I understood the challenges in balancing public health benefits with individuals rights and freedoms.Īt that time, my thoughts were that the reason to have mandates was primarily for settings in which the virus could spread easily. Reluctant Conservative governments had no choice but to acquiesce to vaccine passports. In particular, intensive care units were being overwhelmed. Furthermore, the Delta variant was causing serious illness in broader segments of the population and hospitals. Vaccine effectiveness dropped to the 70 per cent range against infection, and the herd immunity threshold increased to 90 per cent range, a target that would be challenging without mandates of some sort. The Delta variant changed this calculus and became the poster child for vaccine passports. ![]() Also, based on the transmission rate of the original strain of the virus, the herd immunity threshold was in the 60-70 per cent range, which was potentially achievable through voluntary programs. However, the argument against it now was that if the vaccine was that effective, individuals wouldn’t need others to be vaccinated, if they were vaccinated themselves. Protests against vaccine mandates led to a state of emergency in Ontario in February. University of Ottawa provides funding as a member of The Conversation CA. University of Ottawa provides funding as a founding partner of The Conversation CA-FR. He is a member of the University of Ottawa Centre for Health Law, Policy and Ethics. Dr Wilson has received funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Canadian Immunity Task Force, the World Health Organization and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.ĭr Wilson is an internal medicial physician at The Ottawa Hospital, Professor of Medicine and Chair in Digital Health Innovation at the University of Ottawa, an innovation advisor at Bruyere Hospital and CEO of CANImmunize Inc. Dr Wilson served as a member of the independent data monitoring committee for the Medicago COVID-19 vaccine trial. Kumanan Wilson is the Chief Executive Officer of CANImmunize Inc. Professor of Medicine, physician, scientist, Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa
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