Leaders of the Far North are working alongside staff with the Sioux Lookout First Nations Health Authority to address a massive spike of COVID-19 cases across the region.
SLFNHA’s Director of Approaches to Community Well-being and the acting Incident Commander for their Regional COVID-19 Response Ream, Emily Paterson, says as of March 24, SLFNHA is reporting a total of 513 active cases in their catchment area, which includes 31 northern Indigenous communities.
“We’ve seen quite consistently high numbers of active cases. We’ve been over 500 for a while now. When we consider the population size of our region, this is really quite significant,” explained Paterson, in an interview with Q104 and DrydenNow.
SLFNHA’s active case counts include 121 confirmed cases in Deer Lake First Nation, 83 in Lac Seul First Nation, 153 in Pikangikum First Nation, 56 in Sandy Lake First Nation and a variety of smaller amounts throughout SLFNHA’s remaining communities.
Earlier this month, the Northwestern Health Unit reported that their catchment area had seen the highest case rate per 100,000 across the province, listed at 294.3. That prompted them to continue recommending social distancing and mask mandates locally, despite mandates ending elsewhere.
Paterson explains that SLFNHA’s catchment area’s COVID-19 case rate per 100,000 has been as high as 2,400, far surpassing Ontario’s average of about 75 cases per 100,000. That represents a roughly 3,100 per cent increase compared to the provincial average.
Earlier this week, Kiiwetinoong MPP and the NDP’s Indigenous and Treaty Relations Critic, Sol Mamakwa, questioned Ontario on why SLFNHA officials were not consulted when Ontario made the decision to remove their provincial mask mandate on March 21, saying the Far North wasn’t ready yet.
Paterson says despite the lack of consultations with their public health officials, SLFNHA has been operating on their own timelines throughout the pandemic.
“I think that we’ve taken the approach of continuing to work directly with our communities to provide recommendations based on the situation that we’re seeing in the communities,” explained Paterson.
She says examples include continuing to use a 10-day isolation and quarantine periods for confirmed cases and close contacts, opposed to the now 5 days used by the province, and they’re continuing to recommend a mask mandate across each of their communities, which they have a choice to follow.
“We take the guidance of the province into consideration, but we’re really there to serve our own communities and to manage the approach that works best. We haven’t always aligned with the province.”
Despite mandatory mask mandates ending across the province, Paterson doesn’t think there’s a direct connection between the lack of masks elsewhere and the recent spike in their catchment area, as their communities have typically been 1 to 2 months behind the rest of the province.
“Throughout the whole pandemic, all of our waves have been delayed compared to the province. That’s what we continue to see, and that’s where this spike is coming from. We’re now in the big wave that the province saw in January.”
Paterson notes a regional lockdown resolution passed by Chiefs throughout SLFNHA’s catchment area, which remains in effect and recommends against non-essential travel outside of the region, has helped to slow the spread of COVID-19 in their territory.
“That regional lockdown did help us through that wave. But it’s hard. Omicron is hard to contain. We weren’t able to successfully keep it out, but we were able to delay it,” she explained.
But making things more difficult for SLFNHA, vaccination rates remain low across most of the Kiiwetinoong riding. SLFNHA reports that all eligible age groups in their area have lower vaccination rates compared to provincial averages for first, second and third doses, except for first doses in children between 5 and 11.
“I think in terms of vaccine coverage rates, we’re proud of the work that has been done and the rate’s that we have been able to achieve in the communities,” says Paterson. “There have been a lot of efforts around health promotion and working directly with communities to address their concerns.”
Paterson cites massive operations across the north like Operation Remote Immunity 2.0 and 3.0 to provide vaccinations to community members otherwise unable to receive them, as well as a variety of community organizations stepping up to assist with vaccination uptake.
“But, there is a historical context to vaccine hesitancy in First Nation communities, that is varied and complex,” she adds. “There are lots of rooted, longstanding mistrust of government and healthcare due to historical and current policies and practices, and ongoing discrimination.”
“That impacted our vaccine efforts, but I think we’ve been able to really work with communities to address a lot of those concerns, and start to build back some of that trust. I think we’ve seen that trust slowly increasing, and we continue to make progress in increasing those coverage rates.”
Indigenous Services Canada says as of March 16, over 88 per cent of residents over the age of 12 in First Nation communities across Canada have received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, with 28 per cent receiving a third dose. As well, about 51 per cent of children aged 5 to 11 have at least one dose.