Key number shows potential for exponential COVID growth
Hamilton’s COVID-19 assessment centres can keep doing 1,100 tests a day after St. Joseph’s Healthcare hired staff.
“We have the capacity to meet that comfortably,” said medical lead Dr. Tammy Packer. “We’re exactly where we needed and wanted to be — needed in terms of the demands of the population and wanted in terms of the (Ontario health) ministry’s expectations.”
At the end of September, the assessment centres were stretched to the breaking point trying to keep up that pace. But St. Joseph’s hired 15 staff for the new site opening Friday at Mohawk College’s Fennell Campus on the west Mountain. It will replace the testing centres at the West 5th campus that closed Thursday as well as the drivethru at the Dave Andreychuk Mountain Arena that closed over Thanksgiving.
The added capacity for testing comes as a key metric shows potential for exponential growth of the virus in Hamilton. The reproduction number hit 1.43 on Oct. 15, reports Hamilton public health. It means each case on average infects 1.43 people so cases increase over time. For example Hamilton’s 31 new infections reported Thursday would be expected to turn into 44 more cases in about five days.
“It is an indicator of what may happen,” said Dr. Dominik Mertz, associate professor of infectious diseases at McMaster University.
However, “the trends are heavily influenced by outbreaks,” he said. “If driven by outbreaks mostly, it is possible to change.”
The main driver of Hamilton’s high reproduction number is likely the outbreak at SpinCo on James Street North which is linked to 85 infections since it
was declared Oct. 5. A second outbreak of six infected staff at Radius on James Street South declared Oct. 14 is said by the restaurant owner to also be connected to SpinCo.
“Big events like SpinCo can skew it,” said Dr. Zain Chagla, infectious disease physician and co-medical director of infection control at St. Joseph’s. “For us it is saying there is spread in the community from outbreaks.”
SpinCo had no new cases linked to it
Thursday, so there is hope Hamilton’s reproduction number will start to drop once the outbreak peaks.
“It should be under one ideally,” said Chagla.
The rate of tests coming back positive has dropped slightly which is another important metric. As of Monday, 1.2 per cent of tests were coming back positive compared to 1.4 per cent on Oct. 15 and 0.7 per cent on Oct. 7. Hamilton’s weekly rate per 100,000 is 24.7 from Oct. 11 to Oct. 17, down from 30.9 the week before. Hamilton had 146 new cases last week compared to 183 the week before, reports Public Health Ontario.
Demand for COVID-19 tests is down roughly 10 per cent from a high of 3,000 people a day trying to book into the assessment centres. The drop is mostly due to the province changing the rules to weed out kids with the sniffles.
Most can now get an appointment within 24 hours. All of the testing centres run seven days a week. Appointments at night are done at the King Campus and, during the day, at the West End Clinic and the Mohawk site located in a self-contained building off Governor’s Boulevard. To book a test, go to HamiltonCovidTest.ca.