SPORT MEDICINE ADVISORY COMMITTEE UPDATE:
(Excerpt)
Presently we have over 8,600 confirmed cases with > 100 deaths or 3 per 1 million population in Canada which continues to rise. Canada’s death rate is at approximately 1% of confirmed cases.
Canada is still in the early phase of the rapidly rising epidemic curve, as is the USA where the peak is expected to be approximately mid April. Although the peak in Canada is likely to be less severe than US our peak may be delayed by a few weeks. This may be due to the early effect of our isolation efforts which we will not see for another week or two or the viral strain. This means that social isolation efforts will likely need to continue at least through sometime in May (this is all theoretical mathematical modeling at present). On a positive front there are some very early indications that the social distancing and other measures in Canada may be working.
Worldwide there appear to be 3 or 4 different strains of the COVID-19 virus with varying severity that have yet to be confirmed. Italy has an 11% mortality rate and similar to Spain, with a Strain that appears to have originated from Wuhan. In Germany the mortality rate is closer to 0.8% and this strain likely originated from Shanghai. Which strain has infected Canada is yet to be determined and may be different from cluster to cluster, but we still need to make every effort across Canada to restrict transmission no matter which strain we have in our region.
We are presently observing a low but steady trend of local transmission cases from China, Japan, Singapore as restrictions are relaxed. This second “wave” is a concern and will also determine how long we need to enforce self-isolation measures.
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