Chatham-Kent’s top doctor is hoping some lessons have been learned as the COVID-19 pandemic enters its 4th year.
The first case of COVID infection in Chatham-Kent was identified on March 18, 2020. Since then, there have been 11,358 confirmed cases, although public health officials stress that number is an underestimate due to limitations on PCR testing.
The municipality’s Medical Officer of Health, Dr. David Colby says many things have changed since then, including the virus itself, but the pandemic isn’t over yet.
“The one thing that is really, really good is that the mortality rate seems to be dropping,” Dr. Colby says. Chatham-Kent Public Health reported two deaths in its weekly report covering March 5-March 11 2023, however Colby says it had been several weeks since the last fatal case of COVID-19 prior to that.
“Overall I hope we’ve learned our lesson and if there’s another pandemic, or should I say when, people will react faster and more definitively, and we’ll be able to get a better handle on it.”
Colby says it’s almost impossible to prevent a pandemic from happening, but hopes that when the next one occurs, improvements have been made to public health funding and policy coordination between the various levels of government.
“There was a dichotomy between provincial political decisions and the medical advice on a number of occasions, which was very frustrating indeed. Political decisions, understandably, are driven by public opinion, which again is not always the best basis to make those kinds of policy decisions.”
If he could go back to March, 2020, Dr. Colby says he’d tell his past self to remain calm.
“That would be the best advice that I could come up with. I lost almost 50 pounds during the pandemic, there wasn’t often enough time to eat. I would say try not to take it personally when you get death threats and people protest at your house.”
Colby is proud of the way local public health staff and other officials have continued to handle the pandemic in Chatham-Kent.