Take a look at where we are now!

I think we've been distracted by the last few weeks of summer, an election and vaccine passports but while we have been following public health guidelines by wearing masks and only attending events where everyone is vaccinated, here is what happened in the province of Ontario: 1/ Eighty-one percent of eligible Ontarians are fully vaccinated. Seventy percent of all of Ontario, eligible for a vaccine or not, are fully vaccinated. 2/ The Pfizer vaccine results have proven the vaccine to be safe in kids under 12 and it may create a better antibody response in kids than it does in adults. In the coming months, this vaccine will become available to our school aged kids. 3/ Kids have returned to school and although there have been outbreaks in schools, it would appear at this time, that most of these cases came from outside the school where kids were exposed to COVID -19 by unvaccinated adults. 4/ Are you ready for the best news? Ontario's daily COVID-19 case counts are lower than what many experts had expected by now. For much of the summer, the doctors and scientists warned of a September surge, followed by a bleak fall and winter. That has not materialized, yet. Daily case counts remain under 1,000 and take a look at the 7 day rolling average. IT HAS PLATEAUED! https://covid-19canada.com/graphs#ON The 7 day rolling average is the lowest it's been since August 24th at 655. Looks to me like that red line has flattened. Get a load of that! It has flattened! That's well under the worst-case scenario in Ontario's most recent modelling, which showed that the 7 day rolling average would be about 4,000 by now. Ontario, you are more in line with the best case scenario. Hospitalizations and ICU admissions are also stable even without more restrictions being introduced and before the vaccine passport system was introduced. Follow this link: https://covid-19.ontario.ca/data/hospitalizations Hospitalizations down by 125 and notice that only 7 people in the ICU are fully vaccinated. Vaccines work to prevent transmission of COVID-19 keeping our 7 day rolling average flat and keeping the vaccinated out of hospital and the ICU. We've also continued to adhere to public health measures, keeping masks on in public and staying six feet apart in situations where the vaccine status of those around us is not known. But....even though the number of new daily cases seems to have stabilized, they are not climbing down and we are about to head indoors for the winter. We are still in a very fragile state and it is not time to celebrate or let our guard down. We need 90 % of this province fully vaccinated. We may actually need 95% of the province to be fully vaccinated. Get vaccinated. Keep our numbers low to protect our under 12 population until they are vaccine eligible. Cases could rise in a matter of days and take off on an uncontrollable rise. We must avoid that. Stay steady and cool. Get vaccinated. Carry that proof of vaccination with you at all times or download it on your cellphone. Log on to your local public health unit's website to find out how to do that. Winter will not be easy and some modelling suggests a spike in cases after Christmas but, for the first time since the beginning of this hell of a pandemic, the experts are predicting a return to a 'real' normal in the spring with COVID -19 becoming endemic, not pandemic..... a part of our lives like colds and flus that still take their toll but don't prevent us from living our lives. Well done, well done, well done Ontario. Get vaccinated. More on how to gather safely indoors so that we can celebrate thanksgiving and Christmas in an almost normal way. The secret is all in the vaccination. Have a great week. Anne-Marie Please share.

We are assisting in the roll out of the J and J vaccine in Lesotho. If you would like to be apart of this vitally important work towards making sure that vaccines are distributed in resource poor countries like Lesotho, you can donate here:

https://www.braceletofhope.ca/ways-to-give/

For non-Facebook users, you can find this post here:

https://braceletofhope.blogspot.com/

VOTE and VACCINATE

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I was standing on a friend's patio yesterday with her husband and mine. They live 7 km down the road. Out here, they are neighbours. My husband and I cycled there. It seems the older you get the more exercise becomes a part-time job just to stay ahead of all the aging body parts. She is very wise, this friend of mine. I have known her for 35 some odd years. We were lamenting about COVID 19. She said, " We are all physically, emotionally and spiritually exhausted with this pandemic." Who knew we would still be here 18 months on. I know I am weary. When we finally climb above this thing, we will see that many aspects of our lives have shifted and as a person who does not like change, knowing that those shifts are happening makes me feel uneasy and very uncomfortable. I guess that's where my faith has to be the focus but it has shifted too. Adapt, shift, change, move on. Adapt, shift, change and keep moving forward. This feels like languishing, not movement. It's harder to find the hope when fatigue sets in but hope is there. Scientist have been working out the structure of the genetic material of living things ( DNA and RNA) for 70 some odd years. They have been studying caronaviruses since 1965. The scientific world has been watching and waiting for a caronavirus pandemic. And as they have researched and watched and waited, they learned the science and technology behind effective COVID vaccines. That is why vaccines became so widely available so early on in this pandemic and thank God they did. The Pfizer and Moderna Phase 3 trials Started on July 27, 2020. We have been studying vaccine side effects and complications for over a year. Millions of people have received these vaccines which continue to be closely studied as they are distributed world-wide and no long term side effects have been detected. Biologically, there is no pathway that these vaccines can take to cause longterm side effects like sterility and infertility. The COVID-19 vaccines are non-live meaning that they do not contain any component part of the virus. No non-live vaccines, and there have been many of them, have been shown to cause side effects years later. The COVID-19 vaccine leaves your body within 72 hours. The vaccine triggers your body to make antibodies to the virus and these are what remains in your body to fight future infection. Your body has been making antibodies to viruses since you were born. Bacteria have been using a type of genetic immunity using their DNA to fight off viruses for 7 million years. Nature knows how to do this. Scientists have learned how to use natural phenomenon to create vaccines that prevent viral infections. Serious side effects following vaccination are extremely RARE, in the range of 1 per 1 or 2 million vaccines administered and these serious side effects ( with mRNA vaccines ) do not cause death when they are given in a controlled medical setting. Vaccines have allowed us to arrive at this really amazing steady stated in the fourth wave compared to previous waves. Look at the 'New cases by date graph'. https://covid-19canada.com/graphs The blue line is Ontario. There is no dramatic rise to a terrible peak in numbers nor in hospitalizations, ICU admissions and death. Ontario's seven day rolling average has flattened in the low 700's. It is not rushing to a peak of over 4,000 like it did in the third wave. Click on the link above and scroll down to the graph that shows the red line representing the 7 day rolling average. That is remarkable. Look at that line flattening. It is no coincidence that this flattening average of new cases coincides with the province reaching a milestone of 85 % of people with one dose of vaccine and 79 % of the eligible population with two dose. One of the most vaccinated places in the world. And we are still wearing masks.....if you are not, you should. It is not time to take the masks off. Once our kids under 12 have received two doses, then we talk about changing mask mandates. High vaccination rates, masks and public health gathering restrictions, that is why Ontario is not living through an pandemic catastrophe. Stay the course. We have got this and even though we are so tired, so down and so discouraged, we will succeed. We will win. We will overcome. At this time, any new cases in schools are the result of transmissions from home or from the unvaccinated people in the students community. That may change this week as students have been in school for 2 weeks but masking and precautions in schools work. The best protection for our kids is for the rest of us to be vaccinated. Today would be a great day to be a responsible citizen twice: vote and vaccinate. I agree with the opinions in this article. Schools will stay in session and we will not lock down again. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/fourth-wave-covid-19-doctors-schools-stay-open-1.6180154 Tomorrow night is out 14th COVID-19 webinar: Finding the balance during COVID-19. It is a great time to touch base, be educated and encouraged. You can register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_GZ_ho62uRMCX8hYskEFCag Anne-Marie Please share. We are assisting in the roll out of the J and J vaccine in Lesotho. If you would like to be apart of this vitally important work towards making sure that vaccines are distributed in resource poor countries like Lesotho, you can donate here: https://www.braceletofhope.ca/ways-to-give/ For non-Facebook users, you can find this post here: https://braceletofhope.blogspot.com/