Good public policy requires a clear understanding of the objective. There is no point claiming you have 'the answer' when there is little agreement or clarity of the question. This is true for all public policy issues, but particularly so when what is called for -- the answers -- are extreme in their nature and consequences.
I've been thinking about this as I hear some people call for more extreme lockdown measures to counter the risk of escalating cases of Covid due to the prevalence of more infectious variants. A recent op-ed in the Globe and Mail, for example, called for a total lockdown and Covid suppression strategy much like New Zealand did early in the pandemic.
Aside from the fact that Canada is not an island, and with agricultural and other essential products trucked across the border every day we could not totally suppress Covid outbreaks without comparable measures in the US, total suppression presumes the objective is to eliminate all cases of Covid. That undoubtedly would be nice, but it is not something Canada on its own could ever achieve. Nor should it be the primary goal of Covid-related public policy.
The realistic goal for Canada and other nations has always been to minimize the incidence of severe illness, hospitalizations and deaths from the spread of Covid. And that is something we can and will achieve without extreme Covid suppression strategies. The continuation of distancing and masking, contact tracing and containment, and priority vaccinations of the most vulnerable populations won't eliminate Covid. And it won't stop mutations and spread of more infectious variants. But it will over the next months reduce illness and death. It will do what needs to be done.
It has become part of our 'days of Covid' routine to monitor the number of cases that are reported with great fanfare every day. But cases are not what we most need to watch. It is hospitalizations and deaths that should be of primary concern.
It is true that before vaccines were available cases were a leading indicator of the hospitalizations and deaths that would follow. But with the priority vaccinations that we have already achieved despite shortages of vaccine supply, and will see at ever-increasing rates in the weeks and months ahead, that should change.
It is human nature to fixate on numbers and worst fears. But we do a disservice to ourselves and our country if we fail to recognize how fortunate we are with the unprecedented development of Covid vaccines--vaccines that may not eliminate all cases but are widely held to greatly reduce the incidence of severe illness and death.
We don't need excessively restrictive measures aimed at eliminating Covid cases when it isn't necessary to do that to achieve our primary goal. We should never forget that the costs to people's material and mental well-being of excessively restrictive measures are great, far in excess of the benefits they would provide as priority vaccination of vulnerable populations breaks the hard link between cases, hospitalizations and deaths.
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