Some public health and infectious disease experts are pressing for governments in Canada to shift to minimizing, not eradicating, COVID-19 while allowing society to resume functioning. Signatories include Dr. Gregory Taylor, Dr. Theresa Tam's immediate predecessor as Canada's chief public health officer; Dr. David Butler-Jones, the first person to hold the post; Dr. Robert Bell, a former deputy health minister in Ontario; Dr. Onye Nnorom, president of the Black Physicians' Association of Ontario; Dr. Vivek Goel, former president of Public Health Ontario; and Dr. Joel Kettner, a former chief public health officer for Manitoba. (Francis Ferland/CBC)To guide reopening decisions, disease surveillance should be improved, including resources for public health to conduct testing and contact tracing effectively, the experts wrote. Protecting vulnerable groupsDr. Howard Njoo, Canada's deputy chief public health officer, said he agrees overall with what's in the letter. Njoo called the various provincial approaches to reopening schools "a bit of a social experiment" based on both risk management and risk tolerance.

Source: CBC News July 09, 2020 07:56 UTC