Living with a pandemic 49

 A Third Wave

While the timing of development of vaccines against Covid-19 have surpassed expectations, the distribution and deployment in many parts of the world has not kept up with the spread of infections. Much of the gap can be attributed to individuals and groups not adhering to social distancing recommendations. Many of us would call it disregard!

The result is that a third wave is upon us. We are well above the numbers that induced the changes to socialization, shopping and travel a year ago. With the latest rise, plans to open the economy have been delayed.

Adding to the problem is the increase in rapidly spreading variants of the original virus. They were rare several months ago. Now, they represent a growing proportion of cases. In Alberta, where I live, 979 of the 6,176 active cases (15.9%) have been identified as “variants of concern.”

In total there have been 1,711 people with variant cases identified of which 715 of them have recovered and 17 died.

When combining all the elements, we are seeing increasing numbers of hospitalized people, lately more every day for the past week. Of the current 280 people in hospital, 48 are in intensive care. Now almost half of them are under the age of 60.

Vaccines will help, of course. Again, here in Alberta 487,493 doses have been administered to date, with 93,414 Albertans fully immunized with two doses. The proportion of our population that has received at least one dose is still small – only 11% of the total – although most of the elderly have now had their first shot, as well as those who care for them in long term facilities. That is good news. My wife and I have had our first shot and are booked for our second in April.

It is difficult to see that the world is close to an end of this pandemic. New cases are still much higher than they were at the start a year ago. In several regions that third wave is rising and much of it has to do with the variants. Unfortunately, in countries where the population should know better, compliance to health guidelines is still an issue.

At least among the older people, vaccines have made a significant difference. Perhaps the younger ones will eventually take note.