Health committee  That's a big one in a couple of minutes, so I'll try to squish it in. I think we can learn from what's been going on in Atlantic Canada and Q-14. I don't know why we haven't done it in the rest of Canada. That's not another jurisdiction, but it's here. Do things early. If you

Health committee  It's interesting, because many times I've spoken to many folks in many parts of this country, and the first thing that people always bring up is, “You're small. You can do this. You can engage people because you're small.” I think what I would say to people is that I've been doin

Health committee  All our rapid tests are run almost exclusively by volunteers. We said, “Hi, everyone. Would you like to come help?” They actually do the swab. They've been trained. They could be a secretary. They could be a librarian. They could be an airline attendant. They do the swabs. They d

Health committee  We have used all forms of the rapid point-of-care tests that have been disseminated from the federal government as part of the pandemic response. That includes two tests that have a machine and are not quite as easy to scale up or as portable, as well as a large number, over 100,

Health committee  I didn't make the decisions; our government did. I will say that the government took great advice; there was almost sole input from public health and they took advice from the science and the numbers. There was very little wiggle on other reasons to not shut things down or put re

Health committee  Okay, I'm not quite sure how to respond to the concept. A lockdown is about distance, right? Distance is a key part of preventing and maintaining control of a respiratory illness transmitted by air. Distance is an important part of that; lockdown generates distance, so that's a f

Health committee  Your due diligence in reading the article is appreciated. I didn't write that; I said that. Just to be clear, it was an interview, and that was an interpretation and excerpt from the interview. On that note, what I'm saying is that the guidance needs to be implemented in areas a

Health committee  The 14-day quarantine has been a large part of our success. I can't imagine that people and respiratory tracts are different in different provinces.

Health committee  It was a co-signed, fairly large group in the letter. The nationwide part does refer to something I've alluded to a couple of times, which is that when you're talking about an infectious disease like this, there is science around some of the numbers that can lead to suppression

Health committee  I think the pillars are core to the management of any infection that spreads with a respiratory mechanism. By that, I mean the way we implement those and the tools that are used, at times after vaccination, etc., are going to be different. Surveillance, understanding where the

Health committee  I'm certainly not a communications expert, that's for sure. I will comment from the perspective of the science and the infectious disease point of view. The engagement part is important. I think it was interesting.... We didn't try to manage the volunteers. Once there was that w

Health committee  Maybe I'll start with the end first. I think we have a bit of a rough go yet. We still have a large number of cases that are unconnected, and we're about day 10 or 11 into a lockdown. That's the real lockdown, not the kind of lockdown you see in some places. I think we're going

Health committee  It's the most important one: engagement.

Health committee  Thank you so much. The invitation to bear witness here this afternoon is very much appreciated. Thank you to the committee for inviting me. I'm an infectious disease physician and clinician, scientist and researcher at Dalhousie University, and I speak from that perspective tod