COVID-19 tests down as numbers of positive cases rise in most provinces

OTTAWA – Two months after the city of Ottawa rushed to expand its COVID-19 testing options to cope with a huge surge in demand, it is now set to reduce hours at test sites this weekend because far fewer people show up for tampons.

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The decline mirrors what is happening across much of the rest of the country, with an average number of daily tests down more than 25% from a month ago, although positive cases are increasing.

On October 15, Canada’s Public Health Agency reported that an average of 77,000 COVID-19 tests were completed each day over the previous week, the highest ever. This dropped to an average daily tally of 61,000 a week ago and below 55,000 this week.

As of mid-October, Canada had about 2,300 new cases of COVID-19 diagnosed every day. This week, that number has grown to over 4,000.

Ontario, which posted its fifth case record in the past six days on Thursday, was aiming for 68,000 tests per day by mid-November. It didn’t pass 40,000 tests once in those six days and fell below 30,000 tests a day twice.

The province has carried out an average of 38,273 tests per day in October, and this month so far the daily average is 33,870.

British Columbia ran an average of 9,369 tests last month. So far in November the average daily test count is 9,101 ..

In many provinces the test numbers bounce dramatically. In Quebec, the province tested 30,919 people on November 5. Three days later, the number dropped below 19,000. By November 10, over 30,000 had returned. BC test counts in November range from less than 5,000 per day to more than 12,000.

In a written statement, Canada’s Public Health Agency said the federal government is working with provinces to increase testing capacity, but said the focus should not be on the number of tests, but on how they are used. .

“We have to intelligently test and test the right people at the right time,” said the officials’ written statement.

Dr Howard Njoo, Deputy Chief of Public Health, said a week ago that most provinces changed their criteria this fall to focus testing primarily on people with symptoms, high-risk environments such as hospitals and long-term care homes. term and people with known exposures to someone with COVID-19.

“I think people are now recognizing that the best approach may or should be more focused on the fact that it may not be the best use of resources and may actually slow down testing for those who actually need it,” he said on November 6. . .

Ontario’s testing system was unruly in September, leading the province to massively expand test site times and locations, create an appointment process, and change criteria so that people without symptoms would not obstruct lines.

In Ottawa, the testing task force that was begging people in September not to get tested unless they had symptoms, started last week to beg people to go get tested. Today, weekend hours at one of the city’s major testing sites have been reduced from 11 to eight because so many appointments were missed.

Ottawa’s chief of public health, Dr. Vera Etches, said weekends have gotten particularly slow. He said the overall numbers have come back a little since early November and expressed no alarm that not enough people were being tested, saying it could be due to Ottawa’s drop in infection rate.

Ottawa mostly thwarted Ontario’s trend of rising cases, with the infection rate dropping from 70 per 100,000 people in mid-October to 38 this week. Toronto cases went from 57 to nearly 100 cases per 100,000 people over that period.

“You know, if the virus level is going down, there may be more people with no symptoms or fewer people with symptoms showing up for testing,” Etches said.

But he said he still wants people to know if they have any symptoms, even very mild ones, getting tested is the responsible thing to do because “we need to detect as much COVID as possible.”

“And so that’s one of the things we’re looking at and we’re continuing to work with our partners who manage the test system to try and explore more,” he said.

“Why do people come? Why don’t they come? You know, these are things that are definitely worth exploring.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published on November 13, 2020.

Mia Rabson, The Canadian Press