OTTAWA – Health Minister Patty Hajdu says she’s happy with the way the COVID-19 pandemic has been handled in her home riding of Thunder Bay-Superior North.
Hajdu, who previously worked for the Thunder Bay District Health Unit, on Thursday said she’s pleased with the aggressive level of coronavirus testing being conducted in the region. But she added it’s not a one-size-fits-all strategy and that what works in big cities might not be the right fit for smaller locales scattered throughout Northwestern Ontario.
“Testing strategy is an important component of restarting an economy. But if there is no activity in a community, then there is no one to test. Just asking healthy people to come forward and get tested for the sake of being tested might not be the strategy that that particular area is pursuing," said Hajdu, reached on Thursday by Skype.
However, she added, in bigger cities and areas where there are large numbers of COVID-19 cases, there needs to be more testing.
“And I think every person working in health right now recognizes that. We’re working with the provinces and territories to make sure they have the lab capacity and the resources they need to do that. We aim to get to 60,000 tests a day in the near future, nationally.”
Testing strategies aren’t solely about numbers, Hajdu noted.
Screening, particularly in areas not hard hit by COVID-19, which includes most of Northwestern Ontario, is an equally important component.
“Being in another city where there’s a high degree of COVID, these are the kinds of things we’re going to have to think about,” Hadju said.
“Workplaces will have to do a really good job of screening their employees in terms of not coming to work when they’re sick, even mildly symptomatic.”
Contact tracing is also another important element of the return to the new normal.
“When there is someone sick, we have to quickly be able to get those test results back and then isolate the people that are the closest contacts to them so that we really clamp down on any further transmission,” the health minister said.
Hajdu said she is confident the federal government is getting what it needs to be in place to ensure testing level minimums can be met. There’s still work to be done.
“The fabric is getting laid,” Hajdu said. “Are we there yet? Not quite.”
Asked if she was concerned Thunder Bay was one of the health units singled out earlier this week by Ontario Premier Doug Ford for not doing enough testing, Hajdu said she couldn’t say for certain.
“I don’t have the data that he’s looking at, because I don’t get that granular community by community data. All I can say is people are trying their hardest to ramp up their testing and each community is different,” Hajdu said.
According to the health unit, as of Thursday afternoon, a total of 5,519 tests have been conducted in the region, 5,442 of which have come back negative.
Add in the work being done at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre and Hajdu said the city seems to have a pretty good handle on the virus.
“It’s really great that everybody’s so seamlessly working together,” Hajdu said.
“And I will say, that prior to politics, when I worked on things like drug strategy that was really a feature of our community that has led to some really rapid action.”
