Trudy Clement and her husband were among the first Canadians caught in the COVID-19 pandemic when their cruise ship turned into a quarantine zone in Japan. In February 2020, the Callander, Ont., couple boarded their vessel unaware of the virus’s looming threat. Soon, they and 3,700 others were confined to their cabins for two weeks.
“We just looked at each other, my husband and I, and it was like, ‘You’re kidding. You’re really kidding me right now,'” Clement recalled in a 2020 interview. The ordeal stretched nearly a month before they returned home to northern Ontario.
“2020 was a horrible year,” Clement told CBC’s Morning North. Just days after returning, her brother passed away, and months later, her husband Steve succumbed to cancer. Pandemic restrictions prevented a traditional funeral. “A lot of people couldn’t pay their respects, other than online or by card,” she said.
Five years later, Clement believes the pandemic taught her to cherish time with loved ones. “If it’s going to teach you anything, it’s going to teach you to grow closer together, not grow apart,” she said.
In the summer of 2021, more than a year after Clement’s quarantine, one of the worst COVID-19 outbreaks in northeastern Ontario struck Kashechewan, a fly-in Cree community. Over 200 people in the James Bay First Nation of 1,800 were infected. Several, including the elderly parents of mental health worker Celina Wynne, were airlifted to hospitals in southern Ontario.
“Mental health was rising, and a lot of anxiety, a lot of everything, because people were scared,” Wynne said. With COVID-19 restrictions, counselors adapted by offering house visits and sessions through windows.
While Wynne cared for the community, her father fought for his life in an intensive care unit nearly 1,000 kilometers away in Kingston, Ont. “He said it was like somebody sitting on his chest because he couldn’t breathe,” she recalled. Her mother, also infected, was hospitalized but stable. “My mom was emotional, because she knew my dad was sick, really sick. She thought she wouldn’t see him again.”
Her father eventually returned home but struggled with mobility. Encouraged to resume his hobby of carving bird decoys from tamarack, a traditional medicine, he soon regained his strength. “Probably within a week, he was up and walking. He was feeling better. I believe in our medicines,” Wynne said.
While personal stories like Clement’s and Wynne’s unfolded, healthcare workers faced an unprecedented crisis. Dr. Fahad Razak, an internist at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto and former scientific director of Ontario’s COVID-19 science advisory table, recalls the fear and chaos of the pandemic’s early months.
“There was a lot of institutional memory and fear of what could happen when something highly infectious and potentially lethal suddenly emerges,” Razak said. Healthcare workers isolated in apartments or hotels to protect their families. Many patients died alone due to hospital restrictions.
The science advisory table, initially expected to last six months, worked 10 to 20 hours weekly analyzing evolving research. “You would prepare what you thought was the best possible recommendation, and a new paper could come out that afternoon or the following morning that would change everything,” Razak said.
Five years later, Razak believes Canada has yet to fully process the pandemic. Unlike the 2003 SARS outbreak, which led to a formal review, no equivalent report has been conducted for COVID-19.
“At a national and provincial level, we have not done a systematic review of the pandemic to learn those lessons,” he said. While Canada has improved vaccine technology, staffing shortages persist due to widespread burnout. Without rebuilding efforts, Razak warns the system could be more vulnerable to the next pandemic.
“Almost every scientist I speak to suspects that the pressures that created this pandemic will create another,” he said. “It’s a question of when, not if.”
Source: Swifteradio.com
