COVID-19 testing down as cases rise
Niagara’s acting medical officer of health urges people with mild symptoms to get tested
Niagara’s COVID-19 metrics dropped slightly this week — including the number of new daily cases — but rather than an indication of a real downward trend, Niagara’s top public health official said the data is a reflection two key pandemic circumstances impacting the region.
The first was Niagara’s largest workplace COVID-19 outbreak, at a Jordan flower farm, confirmed on Nov. 10, said Dr. Mustafa Hirji, Niagara’s acting medical officer of health.
The more than 50 infections skewed several metrics upwards, including the critical number of cases per 100,000 people which the provincial government uses to evaluate the extent of pandemic restrictions are imposed on a community.
The other is a significant decline in COVID-19 testing numbers across the province, which Hirji said likely means there are more unidentified cases lurking in the community. That is a worrying circumstance, he said, because Niagara’s overall infection is higher now than it was in the first spring wave of the novel coronavirus.
This means the true infection rate in Niagara is higher than the data currently shows.
“The province says Ontario has a testing capacity of about 75,000 tests a day, but is only processing about 40,000,” Hirji said.
Although a community cannot test its way out of a pandemic, testing is a key element in the public health department’s efforts to restrain the spread of the virus.
When a positive test is confirmed, public health contact tracers trace down where an infected person has been, locate those they have been in contact to get them into isolation and get tested.
This is called “breaking the train of transmission” by taking other infected people out of public circulation until they recover.
However, as testing numbers have fallen and the number of new cases has risen, Hirji worries there is a significant number of unidentified cases that are spreading the virus.
“Testing is not really the forefront of the public discourse and messaging right now, so I think it is getting a little bit lost,” Hirji said.
Hirji is renewing his calls for people with even the mildest of COVID-19 related symptoms to get tested so the public health department can have a more accurate picture of the pandemic spread in Niagara, and break those trains of transmission.
Hirji said workplaces also need to do a better job of screening employees every day, and ensure employees with symptoms are not going to work.
While the bulk of new COVID-19 cases in Niagara are being driven by young adults having gatherings in bars, restaurants and house parties, Hirji said people with symptoms or not getting tests is an important source of new infections.
He said some people won’t accept they could have COVID-19 or, since the symptoms are mild, are ignoring them. Others may not get tested because they are afraid that if they are COVID-19 positive they could lose pay or even lose their jobs entirely.
During a regional council meeting Wednesday night, Hirji said his department has been calling on the provincial and federal governments to ensure people who test positive for COVID-19 get sick pay for the roughly two weeks it takes most people to recover from the virus.
Niagara confirmed 20 new cases Thursday, while the number of active cases declined to a 177, down from a post-summer high of 279 on Nov. 11.
At least 81 Niagara residents with the virus have died since the start of the pandemic. Of those, 17 have died since Oct. 5 and all but one of them were residents of long-term-care or retirement homes.
The local COVID-19 death rate in November has already exceeded the number from October, and given overall community infection rate, Hirji said he expects there will be more preventable deaths unless the community acts to reduce the number cases.