Tomorrow I have a story coming out about DIY contact tracing. A teacher found out his child had been exposed to COVID last Tuesday, his wife had symptoms the same day and he had them Wednesday. But it wasn't until today that anyone else was notified by public health. #COVID19BC
Instead this couple took it upon themselves to reach out to colleagues and contacts. It means one person who was potentially exposed and contagious went into isolation a full week earlier than they would have had they waited for contact tracers.
The teacher also asked on Tuesday— when his wife was syptomatic and they knew their kid had been exposed — if he should stay home Wednesday. He was told no, but opted to anyways. It wasn't until Wednesday evening he showed syptoms, but he is confirmed to have had COVID-19.
The couple is also not sure the school exposure notice would have gone out yet had they not been proactive about asking. It was only yesterday that public health asked her about *her* contacts and she made sure to tell them about her husband's.
There are other stories about this but essentially BCCDC guidelines are: You are only given contact tracing after you test positive. Not if you are sick and live with someone who has tested positive. They still will wait 2-4 days for those test results to come back
And even then, in this case, it was four days after she tested positive that contact tracing started.

Here's the thing though: As case counts go up, so do the demands on contact tracing.

One month ago there were 3 positive cases in Northern Health.

Today it was 48.
Assume, say, an average of 3 contacts per person. If there are three positives in a day, that's nine calls to potential contacts. I could do that in a morning.

If it's 48 cases a day that is 144 potential contacts. You need a team for that.
This couple is not speaking out because they think health officials are doing a bad job. It's because with so many new cases every day, they fear health officials and contact tracers are overwhelmed and falling behind. And that can mean bad things moving forward.
Anyways, story on tomorrow @daybreaknorth @ 7:10 Pacific. Stream live: cbc.ca/daybreaknorth/…
And here is the online version cbc.ca/news/canada/br…

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More from @akurjata

11 Dec
OK a lot of COVID-19 stuff has been happening today in Northern B.C. so here's my best attempt at gathering it into a single thread. #cityofPG #bcpoli
First the big news: a rapid-response team is in Fort St. James, two hours away from Prince George, as there is a major cluster of cases there. cbc.ca/news/canada/br…
This morning, BC Emergency Health Services said they'd been told 60 active cases in the community. I was told that number was accurate by a health care person in the community. But as of this afternoon, Northern Health says the active case count is approx. 40 active in Omineca
Read 11 tweets
10 Dec
1 in 25 people have COVID-19 in a small, rural community. Did residents get a warning from health officials? No, because that would violate "privacy". Instead they find out when an emergency team is deployed because local paramedics are overwhelmed #bcpoli cbc.ca/news/canada/br…
Literally since the beginning of this pandemic local officials and First Nations have been pleading with the B.C. government to release more local health data in line with what people get in nearly every other province in Canada. There has been an outright refusal to do. Now this
I said this yesterday but you have to understand: Health officials would have seen case counts rising in Fort St. James. They would have seen it go from 1 in 50 people to 1 in 30 to 1 in 25 and still, nobody thought that the people who live there had a right to know #bcpoli
Read 9 tweets
10 Dec
"With 60 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in a community of roughly 1,500, BC Emergency Health Services has deployed a Major Incident Rapid Response Team to Fort St. James Wednesday, Dec. 9.

"This is the first time the team has been deployed, a BC EHS spokesperson said."

#COVID19BC
This was publicly posted by a doctor in Fort St James yesterday
The Nak'azdli Whut'en First Nation says they are now in 'shut down mode' given the high case counts in the Fort St. James area. A special emergency response team has been deployed to the community to help deal with COVID-19. #COVID19BC
Read 5 tweets
21 Nov
It's Friday night twitter so I'm gonna go on a little rant here about the government secrecy and COVID-19
Someone died of COVID- where did they live?

There is a care home outbreak. How many people have died there?

How many ICU beds are there in northern B.C.?

If you thought the public should have access to any of that information you'd be wrong, based on government patterns
How many cases in schools?

What about infections in healthcare workers?

Again, no.
Read 17 tweets
19 Nov
14 workers test positive for COVID-19 at LNG Canada worksite in Kitimat, B.C. cbc.ca/1.5808832
There have been calls for work camps to shut down since the beginning of this crisis. The former head of the Northern Health Authority called them "essentially land locked cruise ships" alaskahighwaynews.ca/opinion/letter…
Instead, though, the province worked with industrial groups to put safety protocols in place. For LNG Canada's part, it reduced its workforce by about 50 per cent to reduce contacts for those remaining in camp cbc.ca/1.5500429
Read 8 tweets
18 Nov
There is now a COVID-19 outbreak at Peace Villa in Fort St. John. This is the second care home outbreak in Northern B.C. Two people have already died at Rotary Manor in Dawson Creek where an outbreak is still active. #yxj #ydq Image
Northern Health says it's a single staff member with no evidence of transmission, which is exactly what was said when an outbreak was declared at Rotary Manor which spread to multiple staff members and residents and has killed at least two Image
So this is why rising COVID case counts are worth paying attention to, not just hospitalizations. Here's what B.C.'s Peace region looked like at the end of October. In the weeks since the virus has made its way into two care homes and at least two residents have died. Image
Read 4 tweets

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