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/

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