One local hospital continues to see that most of its COVID-19 patients have not been vaccinated.
An update on COVID-19 cases at Windsor Regional Hospital was provided at its monthly board meeting Thursday afternoon. The hospital system is still looking at a majority of patients who are either not vaccinated or partially vaccinated.
Hospital CEO David Musyj said those trends should be considered as the weather turns colder and more people will be indoors.
"Even though our numbers on a daily scale are relatively small, when you look at them going back historically a few months, the trend that is happening provincially, nationally, internationally, and the message that continually gets sent, is that the unvaccinated are the ones who are becoming positive, becoming hospitalized, and they're the ones who are unfortunately going to the ICU, and unfortunately passing away."
Since June 29, the hospital admitted 184 COVID-positive patients, with 73 per cent of them either not vaccinated or partially vaccinated. Of those, 42 patients were admitted to the ICU, and 86 per cent of them were not fully vaccinated.
Hospital Chief of Staff Doctor Wassim Saad also weighed in on the debate between infection-induced immunity and vaccine-based immunity. While some who have had the virus believe they are immune to it, Saad said infection-based immunity is no guarantee of protection.
"The one thing that we know for sure is that if you get vaccinated, the response to vaccination is standardized, meaning if you gave 100 people the vaccine, all of them will have a standard response, and they will be protected over 95 per cent from becoming severely infected, from getting into the ICU, and from dying," said Saad. "But if 100 people are infected with COVID, the reactions can be so varied, and their immune responses so varied, that it is unpredictable."
The update came the day after the Ontario government opened up COVID-19 booster shots to more residents.
As of Thursday, there was a total of nine patients in Windsor-Essex hospitals with COVID-19, according to the Windsor-Essex County Health Unit. Seven of them were not fully vaccinated.
