COVID: How will WHO’s emergency decision affect Canada?

The World Health Organization Emergency Committee will decide January 27 if the COVID-19 pandemic continues to be a global emergency, and the decision could impact how governments, including Canada, deal with the virus.

The title of the declaration of emergency, known as a public health emergency of international concern, is the highest level of alert for the United Nations agency and the issuance of the declaration helps to accelerate research, funding and international public health action to address the contain disease.

At a news conference Friday, federal public health officials told reporters that Canada will continue to monitor COVID-19 subvariants and urged people to get booster doses. As Omicron’s newest sub-variant, the Kraken, spread across the country, officials said the pandemic is not over.

The WHO committee is made up of independent experts who will evaluate the viral evolution of COVID-19 and the pressure it is putting on health services around the world.

Friday said Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer, said the UN’s decision was an “important deliberation”.

“Whatever the WHO director-general decides, I think we should just keep doing what we’re doing now,” she said.

The latest Omicron subvariant XBB.1.5, nicknamed ‘Kraken’, is the dominant variant in the United States and is beginning to spread across Canada. It is the most transmissible variant to date, experts warn, but is not tied to increasing severity.

“In the coming year, we need to continue to monitor the evolution of the virus, the Omicron variant, because it’s still spreading quite a bit around the world, it’s going to undergo mutations,” Tam said at the press conference.

COVID-19 vaccine equality around the world remains under scrutiny by officials to prevent more variants from emerging. Places like the Global South don’t have access to vaccines, while Western countries offer multiple boosters.

“Much more needs to be done to address global vaccine disparities and prevent the emergence of the next devastating variant,” a report published in October 2022 in the International Journal of Infection Diseases reads.

During the three years since the declaration, the UN has met periodically to reaffirm the global COVID-19 emergency. It was last reconfirmed in July 2022.

Canada’s Deputy Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Howard Njoo warned people who thought the pandemic is over.

“We have not yet reached the end of the pandemic,” Njoo said in French at Friday’s press conference. “I think we are past the acute phase of the pandemic, but of course the virus continues to circulate in Canada and around the world.”

Canadian hospitals have been under pressure in recent months as nurse burnout, COVID-19, the flu and RSV have serious consequences for the number of patients accepted and emergency room waiting times.

Njoo emphasized the continued monitoring of COVID-19 for new variants and research into long-term symptoms of the virus.

“We keep sending out the same messages: get vaccinated, keep your vaccinations up to date and we will see what happens,” Njoo said. “Treatment and research are still very important against COVID, vaccines may also need to be adapted. We should not be wary.”