GUELPH POLITICAST #330 – Still COVID (Series Finale)

It was at the beginning of March 2020 when Dr. Mercer first appeared on the Guelph Politicast to talk about COVID-19: What would happen if, and when, COVID-19 came to Canada? A few weeks later, COVID was here. After that, Dr. Mercer became a regular guest on this podcast, stopping by once every quarter to talk about the pandemic, and now we have arrived at this, the final edition of "Still COVID."

Since the last "Still COVID" in mid-March, we’ve seen a lot of the mandates rolled back, and even holdouts like the University of Guelph have announced that they will be ending their masking mandate on July 1. Still, mask mandates at the Guelph General Hospital remain, and they also remain at most medical settings, which may speak to this current conundrum: Is the pandemic over? Because we’re sure acting like it is.

We’re also not seeing the cases go down as far as we’re used to, there are still around 100 active cases in this region, and we don't have the same testing capacity we did this time last year. Is it because we’re going maskless? Is it because the new COVID strains are so potent? Is it because our vaccines’ potency is waning? Is it all three? And what happens in the fall when we starting going back inside, and hanging out together maskless?

That is one of the questions we will put to Dr. Nicola Mercer this week, along with whether the pandemic is over, and if being the only one in the room wearing a mask really makes a difference. She will also discuss public health’s COVID plans for the fall, rolling out the next phase of vaccines, and the best strategy to avoid getting COVID now. And finally, Dr. Mercer will tell you why you don’t really need to worry too much about monkeypox with some very limited exceptions.

So, for the last time, let's talk about why we're "Still COVID" on this week's edition of the Guelph Politicast!

You can stay up to date with all the latest information concerning the pandemic, as well as the now weekly case count, at the Public Health website.

The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here, or download them on your favourite podcast app at Apple, Stitcher, Google, TuneIn and Spotify .

Also, when you subscribe to the Guelph Politicast channel and you will also get an episode of Open Sources Guelph every Monday, and an episode of End Credits every Friday.