Five years after the declaration of the COVID-19 pandemic; a look back at the impacts, achievements, and challenges ahead in Canada

Five years ago this week, the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic, warning that the situation in many countries would worsen.

At the time, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said:
“We expect the number of cases, deaths and countries affected to increase.”

As of March 12, 2020, Canada had reported 1,360 cases of COVID-19. In just a few days, governments closed schools, told travelers to self-isolate, the Canadian parliament was closed, and the borders were closed to most travelers.

Now, five years later, COVID-19 is a thing of the past for many Canadians, but its effects remain and continue to affect people’s health. Here’s a look at those effects.

How Canada’s response to the pandemic has been effective

In the early months of the coronavirus outbreak, staying home was a way to protect people’s health and Canada’s health system from the new virus.

“Canadians were faced with strict restrictions, but they were very effective,” says Dr. Fahad Razzak, an internist at St. Michael’s Hospital and a professor at the University of Toronto.

There was one notable exception, he says: nursing homes.

According to Dr. Razzak’s team, Canada had the second-lowest death rate after Japan, and also had the highest two-dose vaccination rate between February 2020 and February 2022.

By December 2020, after the second wave of COVID-19 had passed, more than 15,000 people in Canada had died.

Estimates suggest that if Canada’s infection and death rates were similar to those in the United States, about 70,000 more people would have died.

“That means many of us probably have people around us now who wouldn’t have survived if we were in the United States,” Razzak says.

Like many countries, Canada has seen the highest number of deaths among frontline workers, such as meatpackers, while office workers who work from home have been less affected.

But Razzaq says Canada has one of the highest rates of deaths in nursing homes among the G10 countries. Overcrowding, staff shortages and poor infection control are among the main reasons for the disaster.

“These deaths are a shameful stain on Canada’s record during the COVID-19 pandemic,” says Dr. David Naylor, co-chair of the federal government’s COVID-19 immunity task force.

When vaccines became available in December 2020, they were first given to nursing home staff and residents and vulnerable people.

“The remarkable thing was the extraordinary speed of vaccination,” says Naylor. “Canadians have also been very committed to wearing masks, especially after it became clear that the virus was airborne.”

He emphasizes that Canada’s early success in managing the crisis was due to the efforts of health care workers and ordinary people:
“For me, the unsung heroes of this era were the Canadian people.”

Nursing home problems come to the fore

One of the most poignant symbols of the pandemic was the nursing home crisis.

More than 17,000 people died in nursing homes from COVID-19 in the first two years of the pandemic, according to data from the National Institute on Aging.

“Coronavirus was just a wake-up call that showed that there was something wrong with our health care system. It was basically collapsing,” says Peter Weiland, whose parents lived at the Héron nursing home in the Montreal suburbs.

His father died of the virus after being transferred to another home. His mother had a mild case, but the painful conditions at Héron were very upsetting to his son.

In many nursing homes, severe shortages of staff and protective equipment, a lack of infection control and the elderly population have created a disaster.

Five years later, some say that while changes have been made, gaps still remain.

In Quebec, training and urgent recruitment programs for caregivers were implemented. Ontario has also announced billions of dollars in investment to add new beds and recruit staff.

“There is still a lot of work to be done,” says Dr. Samir Sineh, a geriatrician.

“We need to look at the design of the nursing homes of the future and how to staff them.”

Meanwhile, the Federal Association of Pensioners is pushing the government to legislate and implement national standards for nursing homes.

“The biggest tragedy of Covid in nursing homes was that we were unable to meet the basic needs of patients,” says Dr. Sophie Zhang, a family physician in Montreal.

“We need to prepare for future crises, with alternative plans and better working conditions for health workers,” he says.

Public trust in public health is declining — but there’s still hope

At the beginning of the pandemic, it all started with solidarity.

People banged pots and pans in support of healthcare workers. They stayed home.

The death toll, hospitalizations and infections rose every day, a stark reminder of the reality of the crisis.

Governments imposed strict regulations: vaccine passports, mandatory mask use, quarantines, and even a nighttime curfew in Quebec.

We felt like we were fighting an invisible enemy. But we were all in this together.

And then everything changed.

A group of people came to believe that the real enemy was not the virus, but health officials.

Some rallied in front of Parliament for months, calling the health measures a dictatorship. Some health officials and medical staff have been targeted with threats.

“Trust in public health institutions has declined,” says Dr. Samuel Vissier, an anthropologist and researcher on social radicalism at the University of Quebec.