With Friday's approval of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine and with the Johnson and Johnson vaccine in the final stage of the approval process by Health Canada, the top doctor in Chatham-Kent says vaccinations will be key in controlling a possible third wave of COVID-19.
Chatham-Kent Medical Officer of Health Dr. David Colby said the highly transmissible variants are keeping public health officials on their toes and that's why the vaccine program needs to keep moving forward to vaccinate as many people as possible.
"I really think that widespread vaccination will have a significant impact to blunt the effect of the third wave," said Colby. "The worrying factor are these variants and that's really what is fueling the speculation about a third wave."
Ontario Premier Doug Ford is calling the approval of the AstraZeneca vaccine great news for Ontario and Canada and added it's a game changer. However, during a teleconference call to Ontario mayors on Friday, Ford admitted a third vaccine will make delivery more complex and asked municipalities for their help and input to make the distribution plan better.
"You'll be the closest to the vaccination delivery. You will know what's going well and what might be improved. If something can be done better in your city, I need to be hearing from you regularly,' said the premier. "This is the most important thing we're going to do and we need to get it right. We need all the vaccines we can get but adding a third vaccine to our rollout plan does add complexity."
During the same call, Retired General Rick Hillier, who is overseeing the province's vaccination distribution task-force, said the province is now waiting for details from Health Canada about the characteristics of the Astrazeneca vaccine and which population is more suitable to get it before revising rollout plans.
On Friday, Chatham-Kent Public Health reported four new cases and four cases resolved for a total number of active cases remaining at 17. The sole COVID-19 outbreak remains at Fairfield Park Nursing Home in Wallaceburg after the outbreak at the Chatham hospital was declared over on Wednesday. Fairfield Park Administrator Tracey Maxim said the home is down to one case among a staff member and all other cases have been resolved.
Maxim said that staff and essential caregivers at the home started receiving their first dose of the Pfizer vaccine on Thursday at the Bradley Centre in Chatham.
"The rollout of COVID-19 vaccine for our staff and essential caregivers is another welcome step for us in the fight against COVID-19 and we remain vigilant in all ongoing infection prevention and control measures," said Maxim.
Residents at Fairfield Park started getting their needles February 13, 2021. The outbreak was declared at the home on January 10, 2021.
The province announced late Friday that Chatham-Kent will move from the Red-Control level in the Reopening Framework to Orange-Restrict effective Monday, March 1, 2021 at 12:01 a.m.
