Bluewater Health's chief of staff is reminding residents there are options available for those who contract COVID-19.
Antiviral treatments are now accessible in Sarnia-Lambton.
Dr. Mike Haddad said initially demand was slow, but he expects that will change.
"Some of it is because not everyone knew about them, and also the access was very restricted to very few, like a handful of specialized assessment centres in the province," said Dr. Haddad. "So, Sarnia didn't even have one. We had to send the patients to London or Windsor for actual assessment, and then if they qualified they would get the treatments there. Not everyone was keen to go away.
High-risk individuals who test positive for COVID-19 can contact their primary care provider or one of the local assessment centres to see if they qualify for treatment.
"So, for Paxlovid, ideally it should be done within the first five days of infection, usually those patients are not sick enough to be in the hospital," said Dr. Haddad. "So this is a community based treatment for early, milder disease and to reduce the chance of you being sick enough to be in the hospital. So, it doesn't work when you're sick enough to be in the hospital."
Dr. Haddad stresses the treatment is not a replacement for vaccination, but rather an added measure to reduce the risk of hospitalization.
"Vaccination or immunity is still the cornerstone, these medications are an extra layer," he said. "So, if your immune system is really down, let's say you're a transplant patient and you're vaccinated but the vaccines don't necessarily work as well if your immune system is down, and now you have COVID, then you're like well I'm at high-risk, I don't want to get sick then let me try these medications that have shown to be beneficial for the high-risk population."
Individuals considered to be high-risk include adults who are immunocompromised, those 70 and older with a clinical assessment, regardless of vaccination status, those 60 and up who have had fewer than three doses and those 18 and up with high risk conditions and have had fewer than three doses of a COVID vaccine.
