The recently discovered Omicron variant, which has so far proven mild and non-lethal, has already made it to Canada.
On Sunday, the Ontario government released a statement confirming that they had identified two cases in the province and that the two patients are currently in isolation.
“Today, the province of Ontario has confirmed two cases of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 in Ottawa, both of which were reported in individuals with recent travel from Nigeria. Ottawa Public Health is conducting case and contact management and the patients are in isolation,” writes Minister of Health Christine Elliott and Chief Medical Officer Kieran Moore.
In response to the discovery of the Omicron variant in South Africa last week, Canada immediately shut its borders to seven African countries. However, Nigeria, which is where the first affected people came from, is not part of the list of banned countries.
Super strange that Trudeau has a hair trigger for banning travel from Africa, but not once this entire damn pandemic has a plane been sent back to China.
— Keean Bexte (@TheRealKeean) November 27, 2021
Still, Elliott and Moore contend that shutting down the only-recently opened border to the rest of the world is essential in fending off the new variant… because that worked so well against the initial strain of COVID-19 and the Delta variant.
“The best defence against the Omicron variant is stopping it at our border,” continues Elliott and Moore. “In addition to the measures recently announced, we continue to urge the federal government to take the necessary steps to mandate point-of-arrival testing for all travellers irrespective of where they’re coming from to further protect against the spread of this new variant.”
Despite the extreme, hair-trigger response to the arrival of a new variant, one of the South African doctors responsible for identifying the variant says that the symptoms of the infected prove mild and non-lethal and are easily treatable at home without medical intervention.
“Looking at the mildness of the symptoms that we are seeing, currently there is no reason for panicking, as we don’t see severely ill patients,” explained Chairwoman of the South African Medical Association Dr. Angelique Coetzee in an interview with Reuters.
“I also checked with the hospitals, some of the hospitals in my area, and one of the biggest hospitals that have one patient currently that’s COVID positive on a ventilator, and they don’t even know whether it’s COVID or whether it’s Delta, or whether it is Omicron related.”
NEW: From Reuters🚨
South African Doctor:
"Looking at the the mildness of the symptoms, there is no reason for panicking, as we don't see severely ill patients"
"The hype that's been created out there in the media & worldwide doesn't correlate with the clinical picture" pic.twitter.com/g7tSas0qqK
— Rosie's Virus Branding Crisis (@DarnelSugarfoo) November 28, 2021
“We acknowledge that it might change going forward,” Coetzee continues, “but the hype that’s been created out currently out there in the media and worldwide doesn’t correlate with the clinical picture. And it doesn’t warrant to just cut us off from any travelling and ban South Africa as if we are the variants in the whole process.”
“It should not be like that.”
According to Coetzee, symptoms of the Omicron include increased fatigue but do not include loss of taste nor drops in oxygen level indicative of the Delta variant, suggesting that the likeliness of hospitalization remains low.
Nonetheless, Elliott and Moore are using the Omicron variant as an opportunity to further scare Canadians into getting booster shots of the vaccine, despite early evidence suggesting Omicron is resistant to the currently available vaccines.
“If you are eligible for a booster dose, please book your appointment today to provide yourself with an extra layer of protection,” Elliott and Moore stress. “The government is working to accelerate the rollout of booster doses to additional age groups and will provide more details this week.”
