The City of Brooks, Alta. became very well-known back in April and May of this year when it had over 700 COVID-19 cases.
Most of those cases came from JBS, a meat packing facility outside of Brooks. Since the COVID-19 outbreak, JBS has been working on keeping their COVID-19 numbers low.
According to the Mayor of Brooks, Barry Morishita, JBS has a plan in place to limit the spread of COVID-19.
“They try to minimize contact at the max. They test everybody going in, everybody gets screened whether you’re a worker or a visitor – they’ve done some amazing things.”
Morishita also says that JBS has been a great partner in educating people in the city of Brooks on how to protect themselves from COVID-19.
Most COVID cases in Brooks are from community transmission. Examples include gatherings with neighbours, gatherings with friends, gatherings with family and church services.
To limit the spread of COVID-19, Morishita recommends people social distance, wear a mask when necessary and wash their hands frequently.
There have been a few outbreaks in the schools within the Brooks community since K-12 has resumed in-person learning, but it’s not exponential growth like it was within JBS.
The reason public health officials are urging people to wash their hands often is because the virus can be spread from just touching a surface if your hands aren’t clean.
According to Dr. Erich Van Der Linde, a physician in the city of Brooks, the virus lives on surfaces people touch.
“We know the virus can stay alive on surfaces for many, many hours depending on the type of surface. That’s why it’s so important for us to wash our hands and keep social distancing. The virus can be transmitted through little particles that stay on surfaces that we touch.”
Dr. Van Der Linde also says that as people speak, they produce sputum, and their air particles could contain the virus, so even if they’re not coughing or sneezing, they can still pass on the virus to someone else. This is why public health officials are encouraging people to wear masks when social distancing is not possible.
A person’s medical history is a strong indicator of how COVID-19 will impact them. People who are most at risk are the elderly, people with diabetes, auto-immune diseases, cancer, COPD, emphysema and heart failure.
According to Dr. Van Der Linde, it will be harder for these people’s bodies to fight off the virus.
“People who’ve got serious health problems or are older, their body’s ability to compromise when they get this disease is not as good as yours or mine.”
Alberta has a COVID-19 distribution plan, which is divided into three phases.
Phase 1 runs from January to March. During this time the vaccine will be made available to 10 per cent of Albertans.
Phase 2 runs from April to June and the vaccine will be available to 30 per cent of Albertans.
Phase 3 will take place in the Fall of 2021 and that’s when the vaccine will be available to all Albertans.
Premier Jason Kenney made it a point to mention that “Alberta will not make any vaccine mandatory.”
Dr. Van Der Linde has one concern with the COVID-19 vaccine.
“I think the only concern that I have with the new vaccine that is imminent is that there’s not great retrospective data on the safety of the vaccine. We’ll only know that retrospective after three or five or 10 years whether it creates other complications, but I think we need to use the tools we have: social distancing, masking, hand cleaning and staying at home when we’re sick.”
Dr. Van Der Linde states that a vaccine will only work if the majority of a population takes it. Ultimately, he believes that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel.