Despite pushing COVID-19 booster shots for months, the National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) is now advising Canadians to delay getting the shots by three months if they’ve been infected with the Omicron variant.
According to the NACI’s recommended interval breakdown, those who have been infected with Omicron are being asked to wait “3 months after symptom onset or positive test (if asymptomatic) and provided it is at least 6 months from completing the primary series.”
Federal and provincial public health authorities have been pushing Canadians to get their third dose of the COVID-19 vaccine since September, when eligibility was first opened up to seniors and other vulnerable populations.
Pick up on booster vaccinations has been relatively low, however. Recent Ottawa figures show that only 45% of adults had received their third dose in the nation’s capital, and Ottawa currently has the third-highest rate of boosters administered in all of Ontario.
Eastern Ontario Health Unit reported only 34% of eligible adults had received a third dose, with 33.7% in Renfrew County.
Polls reveal that Canadians are largely against the prospect of mandatory booster shots, with a survey from September suggesting a majority of 52% opposed to businesses forcing their employees into a third vaccine.
In Ontario, the Liberal opposition has demanded that the province’s vaccine passport program require three doses for anybody to be considered fully vaccinated – something the Quebec government has already announced.
“In essence, this is my call out to Doug Ford to say given all of the lessons that we have learned during this pandemic – lessons that I would have hoped that Doug Ford himself would have learned – this is not the time to be weak, and this is not the time to be half-hearted,” Ontario Liberal Party leader Del Duca said.
“We need real responsible and competent leadership at this moment to make sure that as the reopening happens and school starts and as the restrictions start to get lifted, that we are positioned to make sure again that we don’t have to go backwards.”
On Thursday, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health Kieran Moore announced that with the waning efficacy of two doses, it was time to “reassess the value” of the province’s vaccine passport system.
