Canada ‘likely at the start’ of new COVID-19 wave. How big will it get?
COVID-19, but how bad it will be is unknown, some health experts say.The turn comes after months of low transmission of the virus, which continues to mutate and has recently spawned two variants — EG.5, a subvariant of Omicron, and BA.2.86 — that have captured the attention of scientists.“We’re starting to see an uptick in cases after a pretty long decline. We saw really an impressive drop in the number of infections that started right at the end of 2022 and continued to all the way to the middle of this summer,” Dr.
Fahad Razak, a professor at the University of Toronto and internal medicine physician at St. Michael’s Hospital, told Global News Wednesday.“Over the last few weeks, we’ve started to see that rise again … It’s that expected rise.
I think nothing of that is surprising to any of us that, after a period of decline as the virus continues to mutate, you’ll have a period where you start to have that increase again.”Dr. Jesse Papenburg, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at the Montreal Children’s Hospital of the McGill University Health Centre, shared similar sentiments with Global News earlier this month.“I think most people expect that there will be a certain amount of seasonality to COVID-19, and we do expect that the case counts will rise in the fall and winter,” he said.“How much of a surge it will be remains to be seen.”With two new COVID-19 lineages emerging just before the fall — a season when respiratory viruses thrive — Razak is warning Canadians to stay vigilant.According to latest federal wastewater data, 10 regions reported an increase in COVID-19 activity.
The latest data was updated Aug. 22 and contained information up to and including Aug.
Read more on globalnews.ca
