Doctors ready to take on bigger role

Family doctors are ready to step in to help reach people in Ontario who are still not immunized, but they are waiting for a plan.

Ottawa's Dr. Liz Muggah, president of the Ontario College of Family Physicians, said family doctors are awaiting clearer details of the province's plan to involve them.

More than half of Ontario residents are now fully vaccinated with two doses and more than 79 per cent have had one dose, but there are still pockets of people not yet vaccinated.

Last week, provincial officials said they hope to include more family practitioners in the immunizations campaign to reach those residents.

Cases continued to drop over the weekend. Ottawa reported just one new case of COVID-19 on Sunday and no deaths. There are 36 active cases in the city, and two of them are in hospital. There are no COVID -19 patients in intensive care units, according to Ottawa Public Health.

Ontario reported 166 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Sunday, with six more deaths. The province administered 170,537 vaccine doses Saturday.

Muggah said her professional group only heard about the province's plan for family health-care providers when it was publicly announced Thursday. She said the college welcomed the news and wants to see a clear plan soon.

“Our question would be ... what's the plan?” Muggah said. “Let's lay this out so that we know what's coming, and when, and can get ready.”

Muggah has been among the family doctors able to offer COVID -19 vaccines in-office. Government figures note that 700 primary care sites have been administering the shots, far fewer than the thousands of pharmacies and other clinics Ontarians have had access to.

Ottawa's Dr. Nili Kaplan-Myrth has vaccinated hundreds of people during a series of mass clinics she termed Jabapalooza.

The provincial ministry of health did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Professional doctors' groups have been pushing for more involvement in the vaccine rollout since it began, arguing their personal relationships with patients can help reach those who are hesitant about the process or unsure how to make appointments. Now that Ontario's first-dose adult vaccination rate has hovered at just under 80 per cent for several weeks, the province has also started to cite the patient-doctor relationship as a powerful tool to reach the holdouts.

Ontario hasn't set a target for how many doctors it hopes to have administering the shots or a timeline for their involvement. Solicitor General Sylvia Jones said this week she envisions eventually having COVID-19 shots largely handled in doctors' offices and pharmacies, much like annual flu shots.

Informal polling by the Ontario College of Family Physicians has indicated at least 75 per cent of members want to be vaccinating against COVID-19, Muggah said. Many doctors are working in mass vaccine clinics and in other venues, but they contend they can do more to help with in-office vaccinations.