Sask. infectious disease doctor answers questions on outbreaks, schools

As the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 rises in Saskatchewan, questions swirl around outbreaks, the coming fall season and the return to school.

Stefani Langenegger, host of CBC Saskatchewan's The Morning Edition, asked some of these questions to Dr. Alex Wong, an infectious diseases doctor at the Regina General Hospital and an assistant professor at the University of Saskatchewan.

This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

Langenegger: How concerned are you about the upward trend we've been seeing here in Regina, particularly as we head into fall? 

Wong: For starters, it shouldn't be a surprise because we're in this new normal. The country has moved past its first wave of the pandemic and now we're in this kind of dance that we're doing with the virus as we await for a vaccine.

Outbreaks are to be expected and it's not realistic to believe that any jurisdiction in the country — really in the world — is going to be immune. That's what we've seen locally here in southern Saskatchewan and in Regina.

The key is really to focus on the prevention habits and the things that we've emphasized so many times over to try to limit the size of those outbreaks, so that we can keep everything under control and so that we don't get big outbreaks which could potentially get more problematic for us.

We heard yesterday from the Angus Reid Institute that 30 per cent of people in this province don't do any of that. They're cynical spreaders. What do you think?

It's to be expected. It's impossible to try to bring everybody on board.

At the end of the day there's lots of modelling data that shows that we don't necessarily need to be perfect and it's unrealistic to believe that an entire society will be perfect.

It's hard to really mandate these types of rules going forward unless things really get out of hand. But in the end if the vast majority of us do what it is that we're supposed to do, then we should hopefully as I say be able to keep everything under control."

When we have community transmission, as we do in Regina, how do we send kids and teachers back to class safely?

I think the most important thing that we all need to realize is that the rate of transmission in schools is going to reflect the rate of transmission in the community.

The most important thing we can all do at a societal level is ensure that the rates of transmission in the community are low, because if they are low and there is a relatively small amount of circulating virus happening then it's unlikely that we're going to have significant spread in schools.

On the other hand, if the numbers in the communities start to increase, we may need to actually look at societal measures in closing, for example, social settings that adults frequent like bars or lounges. Things that are nice to have but are not mandatory. I wouldn't say that adults spending time in bars and lounges is more important than being able to have our kids go to school and actually have a proper education.

That's the first piece. The second piece is all the stuff that actually has to happen in schools.

There's a lot of interventions that are probably going to make it much more optimal. Frankly masks in schools in settings where kids cannot physically distance, which would include classrooms, is probably not going to be enough in and of itself. We need additional interventions including physical distancing measures, potentially staggering classes and allowing for remote learning opportunities.

We're going to have to be flexible and look at strategies where we're going to be able to mitigate spread. Contact tracing and testing is also key in schools. We know that. So keeping kids within a certain bubble and really limiting that bubble size is going to be important for limiting outbreaks.

What should parents know if their child gets sick?

The key thing is to have a zero threshold. If your child has symptoms of any sort, they should be kept at home. They should be isolated and they should be tested again. This is absolutely crucial in terms of early intervention and identifying cases so that we can try and get on top of those cases before things get out of hand.

It's tough. There's allergies going around right now. Crop season is coming into form. So call 811 and get advice.

We're ramping up our testing capacity. We really need to ramp up our contact tracing capacity across the province as well.

Make certain that you keep your children safe. Get them tested.

What do you think we ought to do to prepare ourselves for this fall? What do you think this fall might look like in Saskatchewan?

It's tricky to really know and, again, we're all sort of hoping for the best. But I think it's important to prepare for the worst.

As we move into the fall and winter when respiratory viruses become more common, it's going to be impossible to distinguish between respiratory symptoms from one virus or from the common flu versus the other.

One crucial piece that I must say again and again is that everybody needs to get a flu shot. Mitigating influenza is absolutely critical in our society to ensure that we have the infrastructure within our acute care system and within our hospital system to be able to look after everyone that's going to have coronavirus and everything else.

I would really encourage people to try to get outside as much as possible. We've learned that being outside is safe for the most part. It's a much safer setting than being indoors, so enjoy it while we can.

Think about ways that you can prepare your home and prepare your living setting for the winter, because we're going to be spending, frankly, a lot of time at home over the course of the winter season.