The COVID-19 Pandemic
Resources for Remaining Safe
It's NOT Over | Remaining Healthy | The Vulnerable
Official Sources Only | Security & Privacy
In the Beginning…
The COVID-19 pandemic was a black swan event unlike anything before in modern times, both in its scope and in its impact upon our everyday lives.
A pandemic…is an epidemic of an infectious disease that has spread across a large region, for instance multiple continents or worldwide, affecting a substantial number of individuals.
— Wikipedia
When COVID-19 began, mostly older folks in long term care were dying. Young and fit people were sure they could beat COVID but were soon proved wrong:
With COVID, you have healthy people who a month ago were totally fine and now they are on their deathbed.
— Dr. Omar Ahmad, Island Health, Nov. 8, 2021
When the milder Omicron variety showed up, the risks of dying decreased significantly, especially for those without existing health conditions that were vaccinated. Unfortunately, evidence is growing for post-infection issues like long COVID and early onset of diseases like heart disease and heart attacks.
Massive Failures of Governments
There have been massive failures at all levels of government to protect the vulnerable and stop the spread of COVID-19. Instead, misinformation and unsafe protests were allowed to go unchallenged.
Too many governments have failed to adhere to basic norms of institutional rationality and transparency, too many people — often influenced by misinformation — have disrespected and protested against basic public-health precautions, and the world's major powers have failed to collaborate to control the pandemic.
— The Lancet Commission, September 14, 2022
Despite notable scientific and medical advances, broader political, socioeconomic and behavioural factors continue to undercut the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.Although many governments and individuals no longer have the same level of concern as earlier in the pandemic, many public health leaders, including members of this panel, continue to regard COVID-19 as a persistent and dangerous health threat.
— Nature November 3, 2022
Neither COVID nor the opioid crisis is the cause, but are symptoms of much larger issues.
Infections Could Have Been Prevented
From the very beginning, the misconception that infection involved droplets had us busy washing our hands and wiping surfaces.
For nearly two years governments and many experts refused to recognize evidence that pointed to aerosol transmission, based on a series of problematic assumptions about how respiratory viruses spread.
COVID Transmitted by Aerosols
Every time you breathe, laugh, sing, shout, cough or sneeze, you spread micro particles (aerosols) into the air. Think of how your breathe vapors travel when outside in cold weather.
View this video to learn why aerosols are different from droplets:
WHO was very slow in recognizing that COVID-19 can be transmitted airborne, not just as droplets (the basis for the two-metre distancing recommendation).
It took until 20 October 2020 for the agency to acknowledge that aerosols — tiny specks of fluid — can transmit the virus, but the WHO said this was a concern only in specific settings, such as indoor, crowded and inadequately ventilated spaces.Over the next six months, the agency gradually altered its advice to say that aerosols could carry the virus for more than a metre and remain in the air.
— Nature
N95 Masks Required for Aerosols
This increase the need for quality masks and improved airflow within buildings. Rather than medical-grade masks (or cloth masks) N95 masks are required and good ventilation is important.
It also means that the end to mandates for indoor masking came too soon — a significant factor in the spread of the Omicron variants.
Weaknesses in Healthcare
COVID-19 has highlighted serious weaknesses in our medical system.
Patients were lining the corridors of hospitals even before the pandemic due to the lack of beds.
In terms of ICU capacity, we count approximately half as many beds per 1,000 inhabitants as the United States and nearly a third less than Germany. Even prior to COVID, hallway health care was a regular state of being in many provinces.
— National Post
Several generations of provincial governments cut health care costs by reducing the number of doctors, nurses and hospital beds. As well, the federal government failed to meet its funding obligations.
We're now in a situation where high numbers of students are sick and hospital pediatric ICUs have no remaining capacity.
The Victoria General Hospital pediatric ICU was on diversion to the BC Children's Hospital due to lack of capacity, from 4pm Monday Nov. 14 to 9am Tuesday Nov. 15, @VanIslandHealth has confirmed.
— Brishti Basu, CapitalDailyVictoria on Twitter
These shortages were not caused by the pandemic, but are the result of political decisions to limit healthcare spending at any cost. The seeds of the current crisis go back more than 35 years:
In 1985 the provincial government had restricted new billing numbers in an effort to limit physicians moving to the province.In the early 1990s the government imposed a hard cap on MSP funding.
If spending appeared to be in danger of over-reaching the strictly enforced hard-capped budget, the fees paid to physicians would be proportionately reduced under the term pro-rationing.
Eventually the physicians' response to this was to close their offices and operating rooms for enough days to balance the budget.
— Chris Pengilly
We see the legacy of this today, where physicians find the cost of maintaining an office and serving patient is no longer financially viable. Hopefully, the changes announced at the end of October 2022 will turn that around.
Weaknesses in the Economy
The “just-in-time” delivery of goods manufactured overseas proved to be vulnerable. Store shelves were empty and there were critical industry-wide shortages.
Many lost jobs or income (some permanently) while governments racked up astronomical debts that could take generations to pay down due to rising inflation rates.
Last year, the government spent $24.5 billion servicing the debt; Desjardins forecasts debt charges of $49.8 billion next year.
— National Post
An estimated one-in-seven small businesses will never recover. Most were shut down while Costco and Walmart were able to remain open. Unaffordable interest rates may be the final straw.
The failure to protect workers has led to staff shortages, ferry and airline cancellations as well as the too frequent closing of ERs and long waits for ambulances.
Uncertainty, supply chain issues and workplace absences are continuing to have a damaging effect on the economy.
COVID is NOT Over
People were eager to quit wearing masks and to return to enjoying events, travel, theatre, sports and much more.
We've got governments promoting the idea that people can take off their masks and have a good time. We have now a documented reduction in people getting booster shots for COVID, and we still have hospital capacity that is way beyond safe, and staff morale is low. So it's going to be a coming s---storm in the next couple of months unless we address it.
— Dr. Alan Drummond, Emergency Physician
COVID will be the #3 cause of death in the U.S. in 2022, even if many have “moved on.”
Mild Symptoms Didn't End Deaths
When the highly transmissible Omicron variant emerged, governments everywhere told people that the symptoms are milder so they would relax restrictions and end mandates.
While much of US society has breathed a collective sigh of relief at no longer having to wear a mask in public, that freedom has placed people who are immunocompromised at risk….Nor are they the only ones. Older adults, the very young and those with long Covid are at greater risk too. So while for many Americans the pandemic increasingly feels over, for others — often the most vulnerable — it rages on.
— The Guardian
U.S. President Biden stated that COVID-19 is over on 60 Minutes on September 18, 2022 while an American dies of COVID-19 every two minutes.
By catering to those that refused to either be vaccinated or to wear a mask, governments have greatly delayed an end to the pandemic.
I think the single biggest challenge we faced is a misunderstanding and often a softpedalling of this at the level of the population.People are clever. People are concerned about their health. People will do the right things if they have the right information.
— Dr. Bruce Aylward
- Long COVID is affecting many of those infected and are no longer able to work.
- Reducing the isolation period means people are returning to work and gatherings while still infectious.
- The lack of masks in schools has increased the spread and endangered education.
The future costs to the economy in lost productivity and increased healthcare costs could be crippling.
China's Approach
China has continued to enforce a strict lockdown wherever COVID appears. They believe that this will better serve their economy years down the road while the West continues to suffer from the effects of opening too soon.
Nursing Shortages
There is a world-wide shortage of nurses. We cannot compete by asking poorly-paid nurses to continue to work in unsustainable environments where 60% staffing levels have become the norm.
If your workplace was critically short of staff, imagine managers continually asking you to work extra shifts and overtime in stressful conditions.
Nurses are breaking down, crying and quitting because of the intense pressure they face on the job due to a severe staffing shortage.
— Toronto ICU nurse, Birgit Umaigba
Early in 2022 two Toronto hospitals called a Code Orange, a disaster caused by a critical nursing shortage. ICUs and other units are severely understaffed. The implications are frightening and not confined to Ontario.
“You Do You” Deeply Flawed
The concept of each individual determining their level of risk (“you do you”) is deeply flawed because health authorities routinely withhold information vital for individuals to make an informed decision.
There is only one way to stop more variants from emerging with properties even more extreme than Omicron, and that is to actively and persistently reduce the amount of virus in your community.
— Yaneer Bar-Yam, pandemic expert
Failure to continue public testing for COVID was a political decision based on looking good rather than science. It doesn't mean COVID no longer exists, just that it is no longer being measured.
In real terms “living with the virus” means living with a normalization of death, reinfections, long COVID, disruption and exhausted health-care workers. People would never vote for a deteriorating quality of life and risk, but that's where public policy is now taking us.
— Andrew Nikiforuk
We have abandoned the old, weak and vulnerable to hasten our own freedom to return to normal. Is that the sort of society you wish to live in?
COVID is STILL Dangerous
We may be tired of the pandemic, but COVID is still killing increasingly huge numbers, even in the summer months:
The excuse that “everyone is going to get it” ignores the fact that COVID is not a mild disease for the immunocompromised and other vulnerable populations.
Those folks continued to restrict their activities. Their absence made it much easier to ignore their need for these protections.
It's just easiest to discard folks who don't have the immunity that allows you to have the risk model where you're like, “Hey I can afford an infection or two.”We disappear from our social circles, you don't really think of us. So it's easier to accept policy decisions that are like, “Let these people handle it themselves.”
— Ti Young
Omicron and Continuing Waves
The emergence of wave after wave was fueled by the highly transmissible Omicron variants and its continued damage is brought on by continued
- resistance to wearing masks;
- vaccine hesitancy; and
- re-opening non-essential services and travel too soon.
The easing of restrictions was based upon “pandemic fatigue” rather than “the science” that is so often quoted.
Too many people have interpreted the government's move to “self-managed risk” as meaning the pandemic is over. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Another wave during the summer of 2022 was largely fed by the removal of any restrictions including the wearing of masks while indoors in public places.
While Omicron was relatively mild in December 2021, the later variants are just as transmissible yet far more dangerous.
There is increasing evidence that repeated COVID-19 infections damage the T-cells that protect us from infections like COVID-19. Could this be the basis behind long-COVID and the increase in the number of unusual diseases like Monkeypox?
The highly contagious Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants are infecting people that have recently had other forms of COVID-19 and feature more upper respiratory, cold and flu-like symptoms. The loss of taste and smell have been reported with these variants.
What About Herd Immunity?
“Herd immunity” cannot be taken seriously when so many are being reinfected a second or third time. It appears that COVID acts more like the common cold in how it repeatedly infects us season-after-season than diseases where a once-and-done vaccine provides life-long protection.
Data is emerging that, due to variant mutations, COVID-19 reinfections are happening, even in highly-vaccinated countries. For that reason, herd immunity is highly unlikely.Also, data is starting to show that recurrent infections could be increasing the chances of serious long-term effects, including in children.
The need to avoid catching the virus has now been strengthened, for both people's health and workforce sustainability.
— Protect Our Province BC
Protections are Gone or Ineffective
Omicron cases can be infectious for up to 12 days. Reducing, then removing, the need to self-isolate will make it impossible to truly end this pandemic.
The rate of infections in schools is very high. Children are likely spreading COVID to their families and thereby to the workplace. Calling it a “respiratory illness” doesn't reduce the risk to society.
How did the BCCDC react? By stating that people no longer had to isolate if they were infected. That is going to make it even more dangerous for the immunocompromised to shop for groceries or visit other essential services.
Masks Recommended
Masks are recommended in public indoor settings, even if it's not mandated in your community or setting.
It's especially important to wear a mask if you're:
- at risk of more severe disease or outcomes
- around others who are at risk of more severe disease or outcomes
- visiting a group living setting
- in a crowded or poorly ventilated setting
- — Public Health Canada
The current “recommended but not required” mask policies are ineffective and a failure of leadership.
We require people to be licensed to drive, we require people to wear seatbelts, we require people to stop at stop signs, and we do these things because these requirements keep us all safe. I'm having trouble understanding why mask requirements or other protections should be any different.
— Jaigris Hodson
Not All are Equal
Vulnerable populations are more at risk, even when fully vaccinated.
We should clearly be making choices that help protect the most vulnerable in our society, but those are not the only reasons. [Fewer people getting COVID] would be better for our world, our economy, our society, for everyone — not just the immunocompromised.
— Roger Haskett
Compared with someone in their 20s, a person over 65 years old is not slightly more likely to die of COVID but at least 65 times more likely to die of COVID. Over age 75, they become 140 times more likely to die. Over age 85, they are 340 times more likely to die.
— The Atlantic
Those that are immune-compromised (About 7 million people in the United States) face even greater risks:
[A]bout half of organ-transplant recipients produce no antibodies at all after two vaccine doses.Compared with the general vaccinated public, they are 82 times more likely to get breakthrough infections and 485 times more likely to be severely ill.
Should they get infected, their risk of hospitalization is a coin flip. Their risk of death is one in 10.
— The Atlantic
In the last few months, Dr Jeannina Smith has seen organ transplant recipients who have been very careful throughout the pandemic venture out for one activity, contract Covid-19 and lose their transplant.
— The Guardian, August 30, 2022
COVID is not a mild disease. The evidence is far from in about the effects Omicron can have on people. What might appear to be mild symptoms for one citizen could well become a hospital visit, intubation or death for someone else.
— The Tyee
Even though symptoms are usually mild, that doesn't take into account Long COVID, a series of long-term side effects and disabilities that can last for years.
Because the majority are vaccinated, the symptoms for most patients were less than earlier. Omicron BA-4 and BA-5 variants are more dangerous because of the sheer number of cases combined with the ease which this variant spreads.
What happens when an even deadlier variant emerges with Omicron's infection rate?
- Get ready for the forever plague.
- How citizens should respond to Omicron.
- How to cut your risk of catching the BA.4 and BA.5 covid subvariants.
COVID a Long Term Problem
There is increasing evidence that not only does immunity from prior COVID infections provide no herd immunity, but Omicron variants B4 and B5 aren't being recognized as a threat by our vaccines.
Long COVID has emerged as a long-term threat to not only our healthcare system, but also to our economy as a once-healthy workforce becomes incapacitated by debilitating chronic conditions lasting for a year or more.
Canada's political classes, which are largely rich and shielded from the pandemic, are likely to become more callous as the pandemic evolves.The cruel truth we are now facing has been voiced by the editors of the British Medical Journal. The most important lessons from this pandemic, they wrote, “are less about the coronavirus itself but what it has revealed about the political systems that have responded to it.”
— The Tyee
Remaining Healthy
Wear a Suitable Mask | Physical Distancing | Get Vaccinated
Keeping Safe
You have the right to protect your own health. Feel free to take any measures you need to protect yourself such as avoiding crowds, indoor shopping or anywhere you feel unsafe.
Avoid Closed Spaces with Poor Ventilation
Because COVID is transmitted by aerosols, small or crowded rooms with poor ventilation greatly increase your risk of getting infected. Sit further apart from people when conversing.
Some settings will continue to be higher risk, including crowded and poorly ventilated public spaces. The risk is higher if activities like singing or shouting, or ones that make people breathe heavily, are occurring.
— Government of Canada
Opening windows and adding high quality air treatment systems can help reduce your risk.
- Maintain physical distance when meeting with people from outside of your immediate household.
- Wear a suitable mask when you are inside public buildings or visiting friends.
- Get vaccinated and stay up to date with your COVID-19 vaccinations.
Avoid Closed, Crowded or Close
You want to avoid
- closed spaces with poor ventilation;
- crowded places with many people nearby; and
- close-range conversations.
Learn more about remaining safe:
- The risks - know them - avoid them.
- How safe will visiting with others be during the COVID-19 pandemic?
- COVID in the House: How to protect your loved ones (YouTube video).
- Straight answers to key coronavirus questions — André Picard.
- My medical resources….
Provincial Restrictions
Provincial restrictions were designed to keep most people safe through physical distancing and wearing masks when in public areas.
These measures were the minimum if you wished to remain healthy and not spread COVID.
Politics, Not Science
Physical distancing and cloth masks were both based upon the assumption that transmission was caused by droplets.
It is unfortunate that politics seems to have played a larger part in ending restrictions than science.
Governments refused to treat COVID-19 as an airborne illness, largely because COVID-19 didn't work like prior respiratory viruses.
Left on Our Own
As pandemic mandates were ended, we found out that we were on our own and had to assess our own tolerance for risk.
The failure to provide current, accurate information segregated by neighbourhood made it impossible for us to effectively assess our personal risk.
Testing for those in care homes over 70 and wastewater tracking have become our only tools in recognizing pending waves of increased infection rates.
Canadian COVID-19 Hazard Index
One resource that may help you assess risk is the Canadian COVID-19 Hazard Index.
- Estimated individual Omicron risks by age and vaccine dose (1 of every XX people) includes a similar risk for influenza.
- Excess mortality tracker.
- Different aspects around the COVID-19 pandemic are discussed once or twice a month with hosts and experts from the Skeena region.
The Cost is High
The cost of ignoring protections is high.
- The cost to treat COVID is much higher than most diseases.
- Our health care system is over-stretched and our health care workers are burning out.
- Treatment was delayed or cancelled for other patients, diminishing their chances for recovery.
- The most vulnerable, even when fully vaccinated, have little protection.
If the health system collapses, a lot more people are likely to die.
Physical Distancing
Physical (or social) distancing helps to reduce the transmission of diseases like COVID-19, although not as much as once thought.
Think of how your breathe vapors travel when outside in cold weather.
The further apart you are (a minimum of six feet or two metres is recommended outside), the less likely it is that these aerosols are to reach you. Transmission is 18 times as likely indoors as outside.
Unfortunately, people now attend parties and other events where they are jammed together with strangers not taking precautions.
Wear a Face Mask
The wearing of masks should always be mandatory while indoors in public spaces.
Some folks used any excuse to avoid wearing a mask during the mask mandates:
- Those in crowded stadiums leave their masks off while sipping their beers then jump up to cheer loudly for their team.
- Passengers on airplanes have their masks tucked below their chin while snacking the entire flight on a single bag of peanuts.
Now that mandates have ended, the “recommended but not required” is hardly going to be effective.
Masks Protect Others
Wearing a face mask, even a less advanced one, can help reduce both the risk and the severity of illness. Wearing one indoors in public settings minimizes the possibility of spreading COVID.
- I wear a mask to protect you.
- You wear a mask to protect me.
Choosing a Mask
The better the mask, the better your protection and the less likely you are to become infected or infect someone else.
Consider fit, filtration and function.
Single-layer masks may work for droplets, but are insufficient to protect against infect from a disease spread by aerosols. Even surgical masks are inadequate according to this January 2022 Swiss study.
Unfortunately “well-fitting disposable surgical masks” do not exist out of the box, since there are large gaps on each side of the mask. Surgical masks require modifications to achieve a good fit. That's because they are made to stop liquid splashes during surgery, rather than made to stop airborne transmission.
— Jeremy Howard
Testing of the effectiveness of protective strategies in view of the lower critical dose suggests that surgical masks are no longer sufficient in most public settings, while correctly fitted FFP2 respirators still provide sufficient protection, except in high aerosol producing situations such as singing or shouting.
— Swiss Medical Weekly
Difficulty Breathing?
If you're finding it difficult to breathe, find a better-fitting mask. I've found N95s better than most cloth masks.
Cloth Masks Compared to N95s
A simple cloth mask or bandana doesn't have enough filtration efficiency to prevent the spread of COVID.
You need to up your game. Wearing a cloth mask is not good enough any more. You want to have a higher grade filtration mask.
— Dr. Lyne Filiatrault
An article in the Wall Street Journal contains a table showing the time to infection between a person that is infected and one that isn't depending upon which each is wearing:
The results were published in Spring 2021 and the CDC expects the Omicron variant to spread more quickly.
It will take 25 hours for an infectious dose of Covid-19 to transmit between people wearing non-fit-tested N95 respirators. If they're using tightly sealed N95s — where only 1% of particles enter the facepiece — they will have 2,500 hours of protection.
— WSJ
- Masks for COVID: Updating the evidence July 4, 2022.
- Yes, you need to use a better mask.
- Why cloth masks might not be enough as Omicron spreads.
- Seriously, upgrade your face mask. Omicron is everywhere.
- Masks4Canada has excellent information.
COVID-19 Vaccines
Much like wearing masks, getting vaccinated helps protect others as well as yourself.
Being fully vaccinated allows for more freedoms because you're less vulnerable and less likely to infect someone.
However, vaccination on its own is not sufficient to end COVID-19.
Vaccination needs to be supported by mask mandates and social distancing until COVID is no longer a threat.
Vaccines Free for Everyone
When booking your vaccination in BC, only your name and BC personal health number (PHN) are required.
- COVID-19 vaccines are free for everyone living in BC who is eligible.
- Vaccines, including those for children 5 to 11, are safe and effective against COVID-19.
Vaccination Slows Spread; Improves Outcomes
Vaccination helps to slow the spread of COVID and reduces the severity of symptoms. You're less likely to be admitted to hospital or require ICU treatment. Your chances of dying from COVID are greatly reduced.
In B.C., the eight per cent of eligible yet unvaccinated individuals make up 54 per cent of COVID cases, 68 per cent of hospitalizations and 72 per cent of patients in intensive care.
— The Tyee
Reduced Period You Spread COVID
Not only does vaccination help protect you from being infected, but it also reduces the period during which you can spread the disease as well as greatly reducing the chance that you'll need to have expensive life-saving treatment on a ventilator in the ICU.
While there's a small chance COVID-19 vaccinated people can still get sick and spread the virus (called breakthrough cases), research suggests they are less likely to transmit the virus than unvaccinated people.
— USA Today
It is true that 67 percent of hospitalizations in Ontario are people who have been vaccinated — but those people constitute 90 percent of the population.When you look at the latest ICU cases, 52 percent are unvaccinated patients, despite making up just 10 percent of the population.
— John Ivison, National Post
Clinically Vulnerable Disproportionately Affected
Those that are immunosuppressed or with other existing health conditions have a greatly reduced quality of life.
People over 70 years of age, and people with chronic health conditions or compromised immune systems, are particularly vulnerable to severe illness and death from COVID-19, even if they are fully vaccinated.
[A] list of conditions that have been designated as risk conditions for COVID-19 by public health agencies: diabetes, heart disease, asthma or chronic obstructive airway disease, chronic kidney disease, disabling neurological disease, liver disease and immunodeficiency or immunosuppression.
— Paul M. McKeigue et el
The clinically vulnerable are at much higher risk of poorer outcomes.
Reduced Quality of Life
Even triple-vaccinated vulnerable patients have been unable to enjoy many of the benefits available to most double-vaccinated people, including eating indoors in restaurants and other social activities.
Visits to essential services like the grocery store, pharmacies and medical appointments are more dangerous because of those that refuse to wear masks or be vaccinated.
A transplant patient in Alberta talks about the reductions to their quality of life:
Vulnerable people are depending upon everyone else that is eligible to get vaccinated in order to make it safe enough for them to rejoin many of the activities that became available (if you're fully vaccinated).
Vaccination in Vulnerable Populations
Those with health conditions can and should definitely be vaccinated.
Vaccination is even more important for those whose immune system is compromised: people with kidney failure, cancer patients on chemotherapy and organ transplant recipients.
Organ transplant patients take immunosuppressants (anti-rejection medications). As the name implies, these medications not only suppress rejection, but also impair the ability to resist infection.
Underlying Conditions Affect Outcomes
In addition, those with underlying conditions such as diabetes, heart conditions and COPD are going to experience more complicated recovery.
These patients, even when fully vaccinated, are likely to have worse outcomes should they become infected with COVID.
The coronavirus vaccines are highly effective in protecting against serious disease, but they are not a guarantee. This is especially the case for a subset of elderly and immunosuppressed people whose immune system did not mount a strong response to the shots.
— New York Times
Unlike the measles vaccine, the mRNA vaccines are not “live” vaccines and are therefore safe for immune-compromised individuals. It is more dangerous to remain unprotected.
Inability to Create Antibodies
Immunosuppressed patients were not a part of the pre-release human trials for any of the COVID-19 vaccines. The research indicates that many such patients are unable to create the antibodies required to make the vaccine effective.
Among 436 people who'd had liver, heart, kidney, and other organ transplants, just 17% had detectable antibodies.
— Science Magazine
In the study of more than 650 organ recipients -- who take drugs to suppress their immune system so they won't reject their new organs -- 46% had no antibody response after two doses of Pfizer or Moderna.
— CNN
A Third Dose Shows Improvement
A recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine shows that a third vaccine dose for solid organ transplant patients greatly increases the antibodies needed to fight off COVID infections.
The prevalence of anti–SARS-CoV-2 antibodies was 0%…before the first dose, 4%…before the second dose, 40%…before the third dose, and 68%… 4 weeks after the third dose.
— The New England Journal of Medicine
Even after this third dose, the protection (represented by the dots in chart B) is significantly less than the protection provided to the bulk of the population with just two doses.
Despite three doses of vaccine, some transplant recipients will continue to have a poor response, about 40% to 50% of the time compared to the general population and could remain unprotected. Because of this, it is critical that household contacts and healthcare workers be fully vaccinated and that extra cautions should still be taken.
— Kidney Foundation
- Relief and worry for immune-suppressed people.
- Three doses of an mRNA COVID-19 vaccine in solid-organ transplant recipients.
- Caught in a 'pickle,' millions of Americans might not have had an adequate response to the COVID-19 vaccine.
Resources for Renal Patients
The Kidney Foundation of Canada has provided resources for renal patients: COVID-19: How to protect yourself. These may be useful for others that are more vulnerable.
