Doctor raises transparency doubts as province’s pandemic tally hits 66

Health officials are holding back detailed data on COVID-19 cases in Saskatchewan, as the province reported a new total of 66 cases on Monday.

A public health doctor argued that greater transparency would inspire public confidence, and could encourage people in at-risk communities to take stronger precautions.

“I do believe the province can do a better job at providing some of these data,” said Dr. Anne Huang, a former deputy medical health officer who worked for both the Saskatchewan Health Authority and Health Canada.

“Without that level of detail, I don’t think the public can be reassured, and at the same time I don’t think the public can take some of these preventive measures.”

Huang spoke to the Leader-post immediately before Saskatchewan’s chief medical health officer, Dr. Saqib Shahab, announced 14 new confirmed cases in the province. The announcement came with no information on where the patients were tested, and little detail on their age or travel history.

A release simply said that 61 per cent are men and all but one are adults. Shahab said “almost all” are connected to travel. The province said “additional demographic information on these cases is not available at this time as public health officials are continuing their contact investigation.”

Cases reported over the weekend also lacked the detailed information provided for the first 26 cases. Patients are now only been grouped into broad geographic categories that leave out any specific cities or towns, apart from Regina and Saskatoon.

Shahab resisted the idea of providing more precise information about individual cases, and notably on where they were tested. He said doing anything more could “potentially identify an individual.”

“On the other hand, we don’t want to give this impression that it’s just a risk in that community,” said Shahab.

But Huang pointed to the example of Taiwan, which has safeguarded personal information by assigning numbers to cases and reporting detailed information for each one.

NDP Leader Ryan Meili said Saskatchewan should do the same.

“We need to know where the cases are. We need to know the ages. We need to know the professions,” said Meili, specifically referring to health-care professions.

“Even when it’s not great news, more news is better. People will respond better to the measures that are proposed when they know what’s really going on. So this gradual limitation of the degree of detail is exactly the wrong direction and it’s irresponsible.”

Generally, Huang said the province’s response to COVID-19 in recent days is encouraging. She said Saskatchewan is “on the right track” and “slightly ahead of other provinces” in its efforts to contain and mitigate the disease.

But she said stronger measures — of the kind the City of Regina passed last week before the province moved to rescind them — will be required if there is evidence of community transmission.

Shahab said on Monday there’s no clear sign that has happened, at least not yet.

“This is a critical point for us, because we still do not have any evidence of community transmission,” Shahab said during a press conference on Monday.

Community transmission occurs when public health officials are unable to trace a new case back to a source outside the province, either directly or through contacts.

Shahab acknowledged on Monday that there are still a few cases that have not been traced back to such a source, including one announced before Sunday. But he said it takes time to “tie all the threads together.”

But Huang worried that Saskatchewan may not be testing widely enough to find cases early. She has previously warned that confirmed cases are just “the tip of the iceberg.” There could be five, or even 10 times as many lurking under the surface.

She pointed to the example of South Korea, which is conducting so many tests that it has uncovered mild cases that may be contagious.

“The advantage of that is it allows you to act earlier to contain a new case,” she said.

Saskatchewan, by contrast, is only testing recent travellers, contacts of known cases and a few other limited groups — and only when they show symptoms of the illness. It has now done 5,269 tests at the

Without that level of detail, I don’t think the public can be reassured, and at the same time I don’t think the public can take some of these preventive measures.

provincial lab in Regina.

Huang acknowledged that there is still debate about whether tests can detect a positive case before there are symptoms, a point Shahab has previously made.

But Saskatchewan could also test patients with symptoms who don’t have a direct link to travel or other cases, Huang pointed out.

Right now, for the most part, it isn’t.

“If we do not have a good handle on how widespread the viruses are in our community, I think we need to do some sampling of some of these people presenting with fever and cough and shortness of breath,” said Huang.

“Because the argument is, if you don’t test, you’re not going to find it.”