Experts are calling on the federal and provincial governments to take steps to curb interprovincial and international travel to stop the spread of coronavirus variants of concern.
While the B117 strain is driving much of the third wave in Ontario and elsewhere, the P1 variant, associated with Brazil, is surging in B.C. and spreading in Alberta and Ontario.
The BC Centre for Disease Control said there have been 1,510 cases of P1 identified in the province, 555 of those cases since April 9, and modelling shows it could be out of control in the province by the end of April. In Alberta, the P1 numbers are still small, with 138 cases identified, but officials warn it could spread quickly.
Early research in a non-peer-reviewed preprint study from Brazil suggested that P1 is as much as 2.5 times more transmissible than the original coronavirus strain, and the BC Centre for Disease Control said the variant may be able to re-infect people who have previously had COVID-19.
Dr. Srinivas Murthy, an infectious diseases and critical care doctor in Vancouver and assistant professor of medicine at UBC, said P1 is driving an alarming spike in B.C., filling up ICUs.
„I would say we’re seeing exponential growth [of P1] right now,” Murthy told Dr. Brian Goldman, host of White Coat Black Art and The Dose. „It’s a race and I think it’s a race that we’re losing.”
Murthy said that P1 is spreading in large part through interprovincial and international travel. He said now is the time for provinces to limit travel to only the „absolutely essential,” and the federal government should consider limiting domestic flights.
There is currently a patchwork of rules across the country around border crossings. While international travellers arriving in Canada must quarantine for three days in a designated hotel while awaiting COVID-19 test results and then spend the remainder of their 14-day quarantine at home or wherever they’re staying if they’re not a resident, domestic travellers to B.C. and other provinces are not required to quarantine, as they are in Manitoba and the Atlantic provinces. In Ontario, travellers from other provinces are „strongly advised” to quarantine for 14 days.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told CBC’s Daybreak South on Wednesday he supports provinces and territories closing their borders in order to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Kelley Lee, the Canada Research Chair in global health governance at Simon Fraser University, said stricter travel restrictions between provinces, but also internationally, need to be considered.
Lee is the co-author of a study on the effectiveness of travel restrictions at containing COVID-19. She said Canada’s border is particularly porous, calling the rules around international travel a „Swiss-cheese policy” because it has so many loopholes.
For example, she said, many non-essential travellers arrive in Canada by land travel to avoid hotel quarantine, which is also far shorter than other regions like Hong Kong, where it is 21 days.
„Since we’ve had such a loose international border policy, the provinces are left to deal with it. And then communities are left to deal with it,” she said. “You’re making your choices about where the battlefront is. That means you’re the foot soldier when you step outside your door then.”
