COVID-19 COVID cases are still low in BC, but rising slightly. As a heads up, Taiwan (2025-05-13), Singapore (2025-05-13), Hong Kong (2025-05-15) Vietnam (2025-05-14), Thailand (2025-05-10) and Iran (2025-05-12) are noting an increase in cases. Long COVID 🎉🎉🎉 This paper from Italy (2025-04-27) reports that people with Long COVID have more abnormalities (microhemorrhages, dilations, and… Continue reading 2025-05-18 General
Category: Mitigation measures
2025-03-28 BC
🎉🎉🎉 This is really amazing. There are only about 40 people in hospital with COVID-19 right now. The count hasn’t been that low literally since Alpha hit! I suspect that partly this is from less testing, partly because of vaccines, partly because the treatments have gotten better, and partly because the number of cases really… Continue reading 2025-03-28 BC
2025-01-10 BC
The province only gave numbers for flu A, flu B, RSV, and COVID-19 for the week ending 4 Jan 2025, but that’s enough to see that flu finally beat out RSV for the most prevalent respiratory disease. COVID-19 levels look still relatively low-ish, though the wastewater graph looks like they are going up slightly. Mitigation… Continue reading 2025-01-10 BC
2024-04-12 BC
Well, after some nice drops in COVID-19 levels recently, it looks like we’ve gone back up — which is probably noise. But it looks stagnant at best. 🙁 Mitigation Measures This BC Ministry of Health press release says that masks are no longer required in health care settings. A lot of places weren’t masking or… Continue reading 2024-04-12 BC
2023-11-25 BC
Most indicators keep going down, which is good! We are now at almost the same level of hospitalizations as we were right before Omicron hit. Wastewater levels might be going up in Vancouver, but that might also just be noise. Mitigation Measures This article says that the province is taking some heat for telling people… Continue reading 2023-11-25 BC
2023-10-03 BC
Transmission It seems like almost all public health doctors talk about COVID-19 as being part of “respiratory season”, and that cases go up “as we congregate indoors”. Some people talk about cases going up when school is in session. But looking at the historical data for BC, I see no evidence for that. I have… Continue reading 2023-10-03 BC
2023-05-30 BC
Local Industry This article says that AbCellera — which made Bamlanivimab and Bebtelovimab, two of the anti-COVID monoclonal antibodies — is doubling the size of its planned expansion in Vancouver, thanks in part to federal and provincial subsidies. This article says that BC Ferries says that it is working hard to hire more crew (including… Continue reading 2023-05-30 BC
2023-05-04 BC
Statistics Wait, what??? There’s a note on the respiratory diseases page saying, “The final update of the respiratory season was on May 4. Respiratory updates will resume in the fall. COVID-19 reporting will continue through the summer.” I thought they were going to move updates to once per month, not stop them completely. ARG! And… Continue reading 2023-05-04 BC
2023-04-06 BC
Mitigation Measures This article reports that the province has lifted several mitigation measures: Dr. Henry did say that some mitigation measures might return in the fall. Yeah, good luck with putting that cat back in that bag. Somehow I missed it, but this article from 21 March 2023 says that the Vancouver City Council made… Continue reading 2023-04-06 BC
2023-03-02 BC
Vaccines Confirming what I said last week, this press release from the Ministry of Health says that the infant Moderna they have on hand will expire on March 8. They say they expect to get more somewhere around 11 April. HOWEVER, unlike what I told you last week, BC says that you can substitute Pfizer… Continue reading 2023-03-02 BC