The following blog was co-written by Dr. Samantha Hill (current OMA President) and Dr. Adam Kassam (OMA President-Elect). It first appeared in the online version of the Toronto Star on January 11, 2021 and is reproduced here with the permission of the authours.
Images of elated physicians and other health care workers being immunized has been an emotional experience for our community. Our professional stoicism has given way to more fundamental and broadly shared human feelings: joy and optimism.
For close to a year now, we have had to work at the very tip of the spear against the pandemic. This dangerous, exhausting and unpredictable work has taken its toll. That is why the vaccine represents a literal infusion of hope for us, our patients, families and communities.
We are thoroughly delighted for every colleague, long-term care resident and vulnerable person who is now a little bit safer. However, collectively, we are still a long way from defeating this disease. As we encounter record highs of cases, hospitalizations and — sadly — deaths, only a fraction of Ontario’s physicians have received a first dose of the vaccine.
For understandable logistical reasons — which include the need for special cold storage — most of the first vaccines were administered in tertiary hospital centres, which have admirably risen to the immense challenge of organizing the safe and efficient deployment of the vaccines.
Getting everyone vaccinated successfully relies on two key factors: the federal government’s continuous and predictable procurement and delivery of the vaccines to Ontario, and the provincial government’s ability to distribute and administer the vaccine to Ontarians.
To that end, as approvals for other vaccines occur nationally and vaccine supplies ramp up across the country, we will need to move beyond hospitals to build capacity to be provincially successful in rapidly immunizing our population. These centres are already stretched thin, simultaneously treating a growing number of sick COVID-19 patients and the usual hospital health care needs of Ontario.
Which is precisely why, the next leg in this crucial vaccine race requires a co-ordinated community effort to vaccinate front-line health-care workers and the vulnerable patients both within and outside of congregate care settings.
Approximately 60 per cent of physician services occur outside of the hospitals. Many of these community doctors — both primary care and specialists — have direct knowledge of their vulnerable patients. They have developed relationships, credibility and bonds of trust through their continuity of care, all of which are crucial for success of any province-wide vaccination program. Grassroots, community doctors will also be essential to co-ordinating the necessary two-dose schedule.
Community doctors must have clarity on access to vaccines, not only for their own well being, but also for planning purposes for their patients. They have been caring for their communities for years, and these doctors are an invaluable resource with experience, expertise and capacity that must be leveraged. Even now, in this next stage, Ontarians deserve a trusted medical professional — many of whom come from, live and work in diverse communities — upon whom to rely.
This pandemic has challenged every facet of our society. In Ontario, thousands of people have contracted and died from this terrible disease. Our already-precarious health care system has been buckling under this added pressure. Disruption to businesses, communities and families has been widespread.
We all desperately want this devastation to stop. Our path out of this is with these vaccines. Doctors are, unfailingly, at our posts and prepared to help. While this pandemic has been a marathon, we need to now think of the vaccine rollout as a sprint. Because in this race, lives and livelihoods are at stake.
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