Thread by @akurjata

Dr. Bonnie Henry interview on CBC @daybreaknorth this morning. First question: CBC (@j_mcelroy) asked multiple times for community COVID-19 data but you're only sharing it after last week's data leak. Answer: Henry says she didn't know CBC had been requesting the info.

Why wasn't this data being shared already?
A. We only started putting together this dataset in April, and wanted to wait for transmission levels to be high enough(?) before sharing. It takes time.

Says they want interactive data

(as an aside, this past week is the first I've heard Dr. Henry talk about her eagerness and desire to post better and more detailed data, rather than saying they are sharing all they can/what they are sharing should be enough)

Q. Surrey teachers pointing to high transmission rates (20 percent+ positivity in recent weeks), asking for masks for ALL grades, more remote learning options

A: low transmission in schools

Followup: but you said yesterday detailed data on school transmission isn't collected

A. "I said what we don't have is SURVEILLANCE data that records every single person. But Fraser Health works with every single school, every single exposure event and we're presented the information they've collected at schools"

Q. Northern Health put out statement saying hospital staff in Fort St. John are "being run off their feet". How has it gotten this bad in the Peace region?

A. Says it's a challenge. Adds "I think there's a caution... with looking at case rates." Testing can increase positivity

(this is a line she's used elsewhere, including on the Vancouver CBC program this morning - that high positivity in some regions reflects they are testing more people and clusters. Her argument is we are testing people we think have COVID, and they do, so positivity is high)

Worries about vaccine hesitancy in certain regions of the province reducing odds of herd immunity? Talks about importance of talking to people about benefits of vaccine, being understanding of concerns and addressing them

There is a difference between what Dr. Henry has said on this topic and what Trump infamously said.

His claim was that a rise in CASES was a result of increased testing while Henry is linking high positivity rates to testing, not the # of cases (1/2)

https://twitter.com/akurjata/status/1392170952230899713?s=19

(2/2) the B.C. argument is that our strategy is not to test the general pop. but to focus on ppl w/ symptoms who've been exposed. Which means we're testing a subset w/ a higher likelihood of having COVID. But B.C. isn't arguing high cases are the result of tests, which Trump did

It's also an argument that's directed less at B.C. as a whole and more at regional areas with high positivity, where it is true that a cluster of family or workplace exposures could skew the positivity higher quite easily.

And it is worth noting that if B.C. wanted to decrease..

..if B.C. wanted to decrease positivity rates, an easy way to do so would be to increase asymptomatic testing or testing of people without known exposure to COVID-19 to increase the likelihood that people test negative, this driving down the positivity rates

In fact, this was a criticism levelled at the government last year when daily tests for people on film sets were being included in the overall data.

Unless you are doing random sample testing it isn't likely that positivity rates are going to reflect true population positivity