Rapid testing, travel, elective surgeries: N.W.T.'s health officials answer your COVID-19 questions

The Northwest Territories is still about one to three weeks out from offering rapid testing, but non-urgent medical procedures are starting up again, health officials said Thursday morning.

Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Kami Kandola and the territorial medical director Dr. Sarah Cook were on CBC's The Trailbreaker Thursday to take people's questions live during a call-in show.

On Wednesday, the premier briefed MLAs about N.W.T.'s next steps, and laid out a three-part plan that came with a lot of question marks about what the territory will do and how it will go about it. The premier also told CBC Wednesday that tightening border restrictions can mean looser rules in the territory.

Missed the livestream? You can watch it here:

What is the current state of testing and how are we going to ramp it up?

COVID-19 testing in the N.W.T. has declined recently as flu season has subsided and fewer people are showing symptoms, said Kandola.   

Cook said right now, tests are still being sent to Alberta and it takes an average of four days to get results back.

The territory is, however, getting new testing technologies that will speed up that turnaround time.

Cook said whether to test people who don't have symptoms is an ongoing debate across Canada. 

"When you get negative and you don't have symptoms, it's really hard to say how accurate that test is," she said. "So there is a risk of creating some false reassurance when you start testing people without symptoms and they have a negative."

Why doesn't N.W.T. have rapid COVID-19 testing right now?

Cook said supply chain issues are contributing to a delay in the N.W.T.'s ability to do rapid testing. 

The strips and chemicals required for the rapid testing machines are in short supply everywhere, she said. 

"We're not going to get an unlimited supply," said Cook. "When we know exactly what that supply is going to look like, we're going to have to figure out who gets the rapid tests and who gets the test that goes to Alberta."

She said the territory is getting seven Spartan Bioscience cubes and four GeneXpert devices, which are the tests also being used in Alberta. The plan is to make rapid testing available in the territory's regional hubs.

Cook said they hope to start rapid testing in the next one to three weeks. 

When will elective surgeries begin again at Stanton Territorial Hospital?

Cook said initially, there was a decrease in acute care services at the hospital because those care teams were working on pandemic plans and preparing for a surge in COVID-19 cases in the territory.

Now that those plans are firmed up, said Cook, elective surgeries and lower-priority diagnostic testing are starting up again. Operating teams are triaging cases based on urgency, she said.

When there were active COVID-19 cases in N.W.T., territorial health officials were discouraging non-urgent medical travel into Yellowknife because they were worried about the risk of transmitting the virus back to a small community, said Cook, "but because we don't have any active cases that we know of right now, medical travel is enabled again." 

When can N.W.T. residents vacation outside the territory again?

Kandola said that during the pandemic, she is recommending against all non-essential travel outside the territory. 

"Canada is not over our outbreak. We haven't seemed to have peaked — there are new cases occurring," she said.

We just have to remember that it was travel that brought the virus here in the first place.- Dr. Kami Kandola, N.W.T.'s chief public health officer

Kandola said she can't predict right now when non-essential travel will be considered low-risk.

"This is an unusual time and I understand that people are making sacrifices," she said. "Unfortunately, this is not the time for elective travel because every elective travel brings in that increased risk," she said.

"We are in containment mode, and we just have to remember that it was travel that brought the virus here in the first place."

What about restrictions on social gatherings? 

Kandola said the territory is looking at first loosening restrictions on non-essential businesses that can't do physical distancing, such as hair salons and massage therapists. Those businesses will require risk assessments and personal protective equipment.

Bans on indoor gatherings will be lifted at a later stage, said Kandola, without offering a date. 

The territory extended its public health emergency and state of emergency on Tuesday, both to last until May 12.

As of Thursday morning, there were five confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the territory, with all patients recovered as of April 20.

Read more from our previous call-in shows: