Covid-19’s impact may last up to two years, say health officials in Canada

According to Dr Peter Donnelly, president and CEO of Public Health Ontario, projections undertaken for Canada’s most populous province took into the possibility of secondary and tertiary waves of the Covid-19 infection.

The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic could be felt for as long as two years, according to Canadian public health officials.

A man wearing ski goggles, gloves and clothing rides the subway during the global outbreak of coronavirus disease in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. (Reuters File Photo)

According to Dr Peter Donnelly, president and CEO of Public Health Ontario, projections undertaken for Canada’s most populous province took into the possibility of secondary and tertiary waves of the infection, which could stretch the period it continues to have an effect from between 18 months and two years.

By putting in place restrictive measures to counter the spread of Covid-19, it may have escaped a far worse fate. As Donnelly said, “Over the full two-year course of the pandemic, had we done nothing, Ontario may have suffered 100,000 deaths.”

Even then the modelling done by provincial health experts is sobering. By the end of April, the province could tally approximately 1,600 deaths due to the novel coronavirus with nearly 80,000 infected.

By the end of the whole cycle of the pandemic, which could stretch into spring 2022, the number of deaths projected for the province range from a best case scenario of 3,000 to a high of 15,000.

“When you think that the mortality of this disease is up to 10 times higher, and you remember we have no vaccine, and we have no specific treatment; then suddenly the figure of 15,000 becomes entirely logical and comprehensible,” he said.

However, a lower number could be in play if the province were to introduce “enhanced measures” like reducing the number of businesses considered “essential” and allowed to remain open.

Of course, figures from such modelling cannot be entirely reliable, as Donnelly pointed out, that when applied to brand the new viral disease, the results could be “inexact.” But such data can prove prescriptive for policy-makers as well as the public, seeing evidence of their actions curbing the spread of the disease.