A facility-wide COVID-19 outbreak has been declared at Ross Memorial Hospital in Lindsay and increased visiting restrictions are now in place, according to a media release from the hospital.

The Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge District Health Unit declared the outbreak on Wednesday (October 19), with 18 COVID-19 positive patients admitted to the hospital as of early Wednesday and the hospital’s Surgical South and Rehab units already declared in outbreak on October 12.

To prevent transmission of the virus and to protect staff and patients, visitors will need to pass COVID-19 symptom screening and will only be allowed into the hospital to see patients who are near end-of-life (within weeks), who are under 18 years of age (supported by parents or legal guardians), who require a support person (when receiving a life-altering diagnosis, experiencing a mental health crisis, or are developmentally or intellectually delayed), who require a support person to safely attend their appointment (e.g., due to dementia, significant developmental or intellectual delay, the inability to effectively communicate, mobility issues that cannot be supported by the health-care team), or who are giving birth at the hospital (supported by birthing partner).

While patients requiring emergency medical care should still go to the emergency department, the hospital is urging those with less urgent conditions to consider alternate options for care such as their primary health care provider, pharmacist, after-hours clinic, virtual care, or calling Telehealth Ontario at 1-866-797-0000.

After-hours clinics can often treat non-urgent and minor illnesses and ailments, such as earaches, sore throats, or prescription refills.

The earliest the facility-wide outbreak may be lifted is Saturday, October 29th.

For more information about Ross Memorial Hospital’s visiting restrictions and protocols, visit rmh.org/covid-19

Environment Canada has issued a winter weather travel advisory for Haliburton County overnight Wednesday (October 19).

Westerly winds and a cool air mass will allow for the development of lake effect snow bands off of Lake Huron and Georgian Bay. Precipitation is expected to switch over from rain to snow Wednesday evening, and then remain as snow overnight.

Total snowfall amounts of 5 to 10 cm are expected, with the highest amounts over higher terrain and grassy surfaces. There will also be reduced visibility in snow at times.

Accumulations on primary roads may be closer to the lower end of the snowfall range due to warmer road temperatures. Higher accumulations are expected over higher terrain and grassy surfaces.

Precipitation will switch back over to a mix of rain and snow by Thursday afternoon.

Motorists should expect hazardous winter driving conditions and adjust travel plans accordingly. Prepare for quickly changing and deteriorating travel conditions. If visibility is reduced while driving, slow down, watch for tail lights ahead and be prepared to stop.

Surfaces such as highways, roads, walkways and parking lots may become icy and slippery. Snow squalls cause weather conditions to vary considerably; changes from clear skies to heavy snow within just a few kilometres are common.

Trent University’s board of governors has endorsed the recommendations of a report on how the university should deal with the legacy of Samuel de Champlain, including by giving Trent’s next college and residence an Indigenous name from the Anishnaabemowin language.

Champlain College, the oldest college on Trent University’s Symons Campus, is named after the 17th-century French colonist and explorer who founded Quebec City and who was the first European to explore and map the Great Lakes. The college also has several pieces of artwork portraying Champlain.

In November 2021, Trent University president Leo Groarke formed a committee to consider and reflect upon the legacy of Samuel de Champlain as it relates to Champlain College, the university, and their communities.

Questions and concerns have been raised at various times about how the university, which created North America’s first Indigenous Studies program in 1969, has recognized Samuel de Champlain, who is considered by some to be a symbol of Canada’s colonial heritage and oppression of Indigenous peoples. The decision to form the committee came shortly after Canada’s first National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, which the university commemorated in Peterborough through a Treaty Rock installation at Symons Campus.

Chaired by Marilyn Burns, the university’s vice-president of communications and enrolement, the Champlain Committee included students, alumni, faculty and staff with a mix of expertise and perspectives that include Indigenous knowledge and scholarship, ethics, history, and heritage.

Over nine months, the committee listened to delegations, received close to 150 written submissions, and hosted an event in which students were encouraged to review studies of Champlain and share their own insights and questions about his legacy.

The result is a 28-page report with eight recommendations that the university’s board of governors endorsed on Friday (October 14).

The recommendations include permanently moving the artwork depicting Champlain from Champlain College to the university’s archives or library with contextual information and corresponding Indigenous artwork, introducing a new “cornerstone” at Champlain College to recognize Indigenous people and language (in particular Anishnaabemowin), and retaining the name of Champlain College but adding cultural context to the name by giving Indigenous names to the college’s buildings and spaces.

The report also recommends giving Trent University’s next college and residence — to be built at Trent University’s Symons Campus by 2027 — an Indigenous name from the Anishnaabemowin language, in consultation with Elders and local First Nations.

“In the end, the Committee was confronted with the knowledge that any conclusion would be unsatisfactory based on the pull of so many impassioned views on the importance of names and symbols,” reads the report’s summary. “It was also faced with the imperative to pass judgment on a historical figure. We landed on an imperfect conclusion, as any would be under the circumstances: that Samuel de Champlain is deserving of judgment and scrutiny but, as some urged, not to be forgotten.”

“Consensus was reached by the Committee based on an educational environment and perspective: that we have learned more through this process of questioning and that learning will be better enabled by keeping the Champlain name and continually placing it in the context of the history of the Nations at the time. In particular, the Committee heeded the words of those Indigenous respondents and leaders who advocated for informing history instead of erasing it — and the reality that, if we erase history, it is likely to repeat itself and this cannot be allowed to happen.”

“By recommending the continuation of the Champlain name with historical context, and recommending Indigenous naming of particular structures and the next College as determined through extensive outreach with Elders and treaty holder First Nations, the Champlain Committee believes that truth, reconciliation and an understanding of history will be realized in its best form — through ongoing learning and dialogue.”

PDF: Report of the Champlain Committee – Fall 2022
Report of the Champlain Committee - Fall 2022

This report is also available at Trent University’s website at www.trentu.ca/champlain-committee.

In a couple of short months, we will be coming up on three years of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is hard to believe that much time has passed. Are we tired of this? Yes. Is the virus tired of us? No.

One of the challenges of a viral pandemic is that we cannot see the enemy. That makes it easier to forget about. Can you imagine if Canadians had said, “I’m tired of this war,” and gave up three years into World War 2? As we now know, more Canadians have died from COVID-19 than from World War 2 combat deaths. Our desire to forget about and move on from COVID-19 is not justified just because the enemy is too small to see with the naked eye.

While we are in a better place in the pandemic, the COVID-19 virus continues to kill and disable residents of the Peterborough Public Health region. Earlier this month, our region moved up to Very High risk on the COVID-19 Risk Index.

The increase in community risk was determined based on increases in several key indicators, including case rates, hospitalizations, deaths, percent positive PCR tests, rapid antigen tests, and wastewater data. In combination, these indicators tell us that COVID-19 is rearing its head again this fall.

While we are learning to live in a new normal, this does not mean we should move on entirely. Our hope is that the days of school and business closures are all behind us, but those actions and other prevention methods during the pandemic were life saving. Our epidemiologists estimate that nearly 300 lives were saved in this region alone due to the preventive actions of everyone in our community. While we may not need to completely isolate ourselves again, there are many steps that each person can take every day to help prevent the further spread of COVID-19 in our community.

The personal preventive steps that saved lives at the beginning of the pandemic are the same steps that each person can take now. In the new normal, continue to monitor for symptoms, stay home if you are sick, and seek testing and treatment if you are eligible. When you choose to gather, spend more time outside or improve your indoor ventilation to move air around and filter out viruses. When you are in public, wear a tight-fitting KN95/N95 style mask when indoors around others and when the COVID-19 Risk Index level is High or Very High.

Finally, and most importantly, stay up to date on your COVID-19 vaccinations.

The COVID-19 vaccine was first released as a two-dose primary series (three doses if you’re immunocompromised). As science has told us since, protection fades over time. With this discovery, a third dose was offered, and then a fourth dose. Now, the language the province and the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) is using is “staying up to date on your vaccination.” What does this actually mean? Well, for those over the age of five it means that you should receive your primary series of two doses (four doses for those who are immunocompromised) and then receive a COVID-19 booster dose every six months.

Why should we receive a booster dose every six months? Vaccination schedules are determined by scientists who consider several factors, including the risk of getting sick (or how much COVID-19 is actually circulating), the best timeline for your protection (or your immune systems ability to fight off COVID-19 infections), and the optimal time period to ensure side effects remain rare.

For COVID-19 vaccines, the best evidence now is that you will likely need an additional dose at least every six months. The exception to this is if you have had a COVID-19 infection recently. Some research suggests that an infection can provide some protection for about three months. So it’s recommended to schedule your next dose for at least three months after a COVID-19 infection.

We are now fortunate enough to have not one but two bivalent vaccines available in Ontario.

The Moderna bivalent COVID-19 vaccine protects against the original COVID-19 virus and an earlier BA1 omicron strain, but has a slightly higher dose. In previous Moderna COVID-19 vaccines, this higher dose has shown to give slightly better protection than the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine. The Pfizer bivalent COVID-19 vaccine protects against the original COVID-19 virus and the more recent BA4/5 omicron strain.

You may hear lots of discussion around which is better but, while the science tells us both are safe and better than the traditional vaccine dose, it isn’t clear whether one or the other will be better. This is in part because we don’t know what variant will be dominant in the future. So, for my advice, staying up to date with any bivalent COVID-19 vaccine is better than not staying up to date at all.

A dose every six months is not too bad to stay up to date on protections in an ongoing pandemic, is it? I get my car’s oil changed more frequently than that, and the vaccine is important life-saving protection for myself and those around me.

Trust is easy to lose but not so easy to earn. As the prerequisite for the relationships that members of Peterborough’s Mobile Support Overdose Resource Team (MSORT) have established with substance users, trust is paramount.

In fact, it’s the basis of the first few baby steps on the way to changing and possibly saving lives.

Comprised of three intensive case managers, a harm reduction specialist, and a paramedic, MSORT reaches out to and interacts with substance users on their turf, the goal being to reduce the adverse and potentially tragic physical, mental, and emotional health impacts of a poisoned drug supply.

Some team members bring to that mission something that is key in the trust equation: lived experience.

“They have a different understanding of what’s happening to an individual and can offer services that won’t stigmatize,” explains Jessica Penner, coordinator with the Peterborough Drug Strategy.

“A well-meaning individual who is a service provider might not necessarily understand how they’re stigmatizing an individual. It’s not possible to quantify the value of being able to talk the talk, to speak to people on the same page.”

Fourcast executive director Donna Rogers concurs, saying those with lived experience “understand things at a different level.”

She adds it’s rare to come across people in a helping profession who don’t have lived experience, “particularly those that do street level work like this, whether it’s their own or that of a family member or friend. The further we go down the path of not resolving the opioid crisis, it’s tougher to find people who haven’t been personally impacted.”

Because the poisoned drug supply crisis and all the issues around that aren’t going to be resolved at any point soon, initiatives like MSORT have a place to live and breathe and do their important work.

A collaborative pilot project that serves in Peterborough city and county, MSORT’s intent is to reduce overdoses and minimize the risk of harms related to overdose and substance use, especially opioids. Rogers explains the roots of its formation go back some five years.

“Acting (Peterborough) police chief Tim Farquharson had been to a conference and identified this street outreach model that had peers attached to it,” Rogers explains. “He believed it had lots of merit for our community. Peter Williams was the (police’s) community development person at the time. He was tasked with looking for opportunities to get something like this funded. I was one of the people who had input back then, but there were others — public health, CMHA … all of the usual suspects.”

So it was that an application for funding, submitted by the Peterborough Police Service, was made to Health Canada’s Substance Use and Addictions Program. It proved successful, resulting in 30 months of funding. While the police service received the funding as the applicant, it hasn’t kept a cent, ensuring that Fourcast and Peterborough Paramedics have the dollars needed to operate MSORT.

MSORT uses the Consumption and Treatment Services site at Simcoe and Aylmer streets as its home base, but it is primarily an outreach service. Ideally, it would do its work seven days a week round the clock but, to stretch its funding, the team operates five days a week from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

According to Fourcast-affiliated MSORT program manager Sonya Trotter, establishing trust with substance users was the first hill that had to be climbed.

“(MSORT paramedic) Audrey would go out in the community and people wouldn’t have anything to do with her,” Trotter recalls. “Her uniform spoke to a system that our clients aren’t interested in. They don’t have trust because there are a lot of barriers. They experience stigma and discrimination — they don’t want any part of that.”

Building that trust took a while, according to Trotter, but was critical to understanding the needs of substance users.

“Once you earn trust, they will allow you in to hear their stories, what they’re experiencing, and what they need to make change in their lives.”

Earning that trust means lives have been changed in a very big way, according to Rogers. From May to August of this year, two people who MSORT interacted with went into a residential addictions treatment.

“That doesn’t sound like a lot, but to get two people stable enough to be able to make that decision and go into treatment is massive,” Rogers says.

In addition, 10 people were housed via supportive housing programs, 17 were connected to the safer supply initiative, and 33 were connected to community treatment supports. Another four, notes Rogers, applied to One City’s employment program.

With MSORT now connecting daily with 20 to 25 people at any point of time, trust has clearly been established.

“We can’t quantify how many people haven’t died because of MSORT, but we can quantify the number of lives that been changed,” says Penner.

“If we didn’t have some of these really positive outcomes, this would be even more difficult work than it already is,” Rogers adds.

One challenge faced by an outreach program like MSORT is connected to the homelessness of many of those it serves.

“Every week, the city takes down tents and moves people along,” Trotter says. “It’s an ongoing issue. When we’re engaging people and we know where they are, that’s one thing. But the next time we go to that space, they’re gone. Sometimes we don’t find them for a couple of days.”

“What happens is they continue to destabilize. That makes it really difficult to implement a stabilization plan for them and move forward. We have a lack of housing. Getting somebody housed and stabilized is an ongoing task.”

When it comes to meeting this challenge and the many others MSORT faces, Rogers is heartened by the tenacity displayed by those on the team.

“They’re a very skilled, compassionate group,” she says. “They are really good folks. They are extraordinary professionals. From Sonya’s leadership right through to all of the experience on the team, if someone needs something, these guys know how to go after it and get it.”

The tenacity of the MSORT team is an important part of delivering on the trust they have earned with substance users.

“System navigation isn’t about ‘I know of three places that I can make a referral for you.’ It’s about ‘I’m going to get that appointment nailed down. I’m going to get you the option to do it. If you say yes, I will move three mountains to make sure that you can get there.'”

Still, it’s a work in progress that hangs by the slimmest of threads. On March 31, 2023, MSORT’s funding comes to an end.

Rogers says Health Canada has been approached for an extension — the Substance Use and Addictions Program can fund programs for up to five years — but, as of this writing, there was no word. She adds if confirmation of extended funding isn’t received, MSORT will be forced to wind down its operation, most likely early in the new year.

“From an efficiency of resources perspective, it’s beyond ridiculous to not have a plan for how you maintain successful programs,” Penner points out. “What kind of system does that? ‘Great job. OK, wrap it up.’ This isn’t going away. It’s not like we solved the opioid crisis.”