What is safe to do once you’re fully vaccinated? Canada’s top health officials aren’t prepared to say — yet

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This article was published 21/06/2021 (1186 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — For Canadians grasping for guidance over how their lives will change as the number of fully vaccinated people climbs, Canada’s top public health officials have a two-part answer: a new risk assessment tool is on the way, but laying out clear-cut rules isn’t that easy.

“It’s not a straight, black and white, sort of, ‘Everybody take off your masks, everybody just do whatever you want,’” chief public health officer Dr. Theresa Tam told a news conference Tuesday.

“We would like to enable people to take themselves through that kind of risk assessment while respecting local public health requirements.”

Tam was referring to a new tool that will soon be released by the federal government to help people chart the safest path for their pandemic activities based on their personal circumstances.

What that tool will tell you “really depends on your individual context,” said Tam’s deputy, Dr. Howard Njoo, citing a person’s health and vaccination status, as well as the vaccination status of the people they want to socialize with.

The tool would also take into consideration whether prospective activities are indoors or outdoors, and the medical risks posed to those participating.

“I think it’s important to tell Canadians, and show Canadians, that there are tools available in which they can take all those different factors into account,” Njoo said.

“So I would say watch this space, and things will be coming out in the next little while.”

So far, about 20 per cent of people in Canada have been fully vaccinated. More than 75 per cent of the population aged 12 and older have had at least one shot.

On Monday, the federal government announced changes to quarantine requirements at the Canadian border for fully vaccinated travellers arriving by land or air. Starting the night of July 5, Canadians, permanent residents and anyone else eligible to enter the country who are fully vaccinated with a Health Canada-approved shot won’t need to undergo quarantine. Travellers will still need to take a COVID-19 test before they depart for Canada, and another once they arrive.

A similar measure is in place across the southern border for U.S. travellers returning home. But when it comes to rules for those who have completed their COVID-19 vaccination schedule, that’s where Canada’s comparisons to the United States end.

Among other guidelines, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has ruled that fully vaccinated people can take part in the same activities they did before the onset of the pandemic without wearing a mask or practising physical distancing, unless local jurisdictions require it. And, those travelling within the country aren’t required to get a COVID-19 test, nor do they need to quarantine for domestic travel.

“What you don’t want to do is exactly what the U.S. did, where there’s a federal body, like the CDC, that makes an announcement relatively unilaterally, without discussion with the states, without discussion with experts, that has led to a lot of confusion,” said Dr. Donald Vinh, an infectious disease specialist and medical microbiologist at the McGill University Health Centre.

The decree from the CDC, Vinh said, led to residents at different stages of vaccination “abandoning masks” sooner than they should have and created the more dangerous perception that the pandemic was over.

“State authorities were not prepared for that announcement, and they had to sort of scramble and rework the message and make sure people understood what the federal government was trying to say,” Vinh told the Star. “The Canadian government has perhaps learned from that gaffe.”

Indeed, both Tam and Njoo repeatedly said Tuesday that if such guidance is coming, it must flow primarily from provincial and territorial governments, as well as local public health authorities.

“It’s not the same in every part of the country. Individuals with underlying risk factors have a very different set of risk assessments as well. These risk assessments depend on individual risk, who you’re about to get into a contact with, as well as the epidemiology of your specific community,” Tam said.

She pointed to other factors, such as the fact that vaccinated people can still get infected, extra protections that might be required for high-risk populations, and the spread of the Delta variant of the coronavirus — for which two doses of the vaccine provides the best protection — as reasons why Ottawa has yet to issue clearer rules.

As for the gradual easing of border restrictions for more groups of Canadians, Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc says he’s alive to the impatience.

“We’re also understanding the very real concerns of sectors of the economy, of business leaders, tourism, the travel sector. Obviously, they’re anxious for the moment when it’s safe, to proceed to the next phase of those measures,” LeBlanc said.

“But we’re encouraged by the trends in terms of vaccination, in terms of case counts, in terms of hospitalizations. So we look forward as all Canadians do, to having more to say about that in the coming weeks.”

Raisa Patel is an Ottawa-based reporter covering federal politics for the Star. Follow her on Twitter: @R_SPatel