Ontario tries coping with Covid without lockdowns

Photo by Aaron Pruzaniec, 2005. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons.

EDITORIAL: A COVID wave without lockdowns | Toronto Sun:

April 1, 2022 - "The fearmongering over a sixth wave of COVID-19 infections across Canada is getting out of hand.... It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that there is a 'spring surge' in virus cases. This was anticipated because this is how seasonal viruses tend to function.

"While it would have been great to completely eradicate COVID, it’s been clear for some time now that the virus wasn’t going away and was instead becoming 'endemic'. Endemic doesn’t mean we’re supposed to shut down our society whenever the virus surges and invite in all of the increasingly documented harms that have come with lockdowns. No, it means we learn to smartly live with COVID in a way that protects and cares for the vulnerable.

"Instead of focusing on the negatives and the potential to stoke fears, it’s time to focus on the things we’ve learned and accomplished over the past two years. Because we’ve come a long way in two years.

"The data has helped us understand who is at low-risk and who is high-risk. Vaccines are protecting against severe outcomes. Testing policies are now largely geared towards identifying high-risk persons early. Treatments like paxlovid exist to shorten people’s hospital stays. The general public has been discussing COVID for two years — they’re well-positioned to make their own informed risk assessments at this point.... 

"The days of broad mandates and the government shutting places down are behind us. Now we have to rebuild and also deal with the damage caused by shutdowns, such as the education deficit experienced by many kids.

"'Unfortunately [Covid] is not going away completely just yet but we need to move on and continue with the reopening of our economy so that people can get back to a more normal way of life,' Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott said on Thursday. The sixth wave of COVID will be one without lockdowns, and that’s the right call."

Read more: https://torontosun.com/opinion/editorials/editorial-a-covid-wave-without-lockdowns