Mt.A professor says province was slow to inform public about long COVID-19
The Jean Coutu pharmacy in Sackville is offering free walk-in COVID-19 shots every Friday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. until Nov. 27. For David Thomas, a professor and head of the department of politics and international relations, the shots offer protection against more than just a bad week of illness. “Even if you get COVID-19, it reduces the severity, and it reduces the risk of getting long COVID-19,” Thomas said.
“You either don’t know it exists, or if you’ve heard of it, you don’t really understand how bad it can be,” Thomas said. Part of Thomas’ research focuses on why the province did not do more to inform the public about long COVID-19.
“The New Brunswick provincial government knew about long COVID and was receiving regular updates on what long COVID is, was, and the latest research about it,” Thomas noted. Right-to-information requests made by colleagues he works with showed the federal government sent provinces those updates starting in the summer of 2020.
The New Brunswick provincial government did not post information about long COVID-19 on its website until late 2022, according to Thomas, and the province has not opened a long COVID-19 clinic since. “Never in any of the public statements to the media press conferences has long COVID ever been mentioned as a problem,” Thomas said.
“Public health, for that matter, in New Brunswick totally failed its task and its role in terms of not informing the public about this particular aspect of COVID,” Thomas said. “Instead of confronting something that’s dangerous and talking about it, people preferred – and the government preferred – to pretend it didn’t exist.”
Thomas’ interest in long COVID-19 began in 2020, when he started working with other New Brunswickers committed to getting accurate information about the virus to the public. “How do we challenge public health and policymakers in this province to follow evidence-based science in their policymaking?” Thomas said when recalling the group’s aim.
Mae Ward, a fourth-year international relations student at Mt.A, assists Thomas with the research. Ward spends two to three hours a week reading and summarizing articles on long COVID-19. “It’s not treated as a chronic disease by employers and governments, despite it very much presenting as a chronic disease,” Ward explained.
Ward sees the same gap in awareness among her peers, most of whom had mild cases of COVID-19. “They don’t necessarily account for the fact that chronic fatigue and the symptoms you feel with COVID really inhibit an individual’s ability to conduct their daily life and activities,” Ward said. Ward has also heard the same reasoning about booster shots from people around campus. “I’ve heard from multiple people around campus that they said, ‘I’ve had three or four vaccines. I don’t see why I would need to get another booster. I’ve also had COVID at this point, so why would I need it?’”
“By getting vaccinated, you’re protecting other people, but then also yourself,” Ward noted. “If your motivation to get a flu shot is to not get sick, why would you not also get a COVID vaccine for the same purpose, especially where they’re free here and so easy to book?”