Health experts in B.C. divided over merits of severe Australian-style lockdown

Former Vancouverite Graham Barron can really appreciate what freedom feels like.

Barron lives in Melbourne, Australia, with his wife and two young children. For nearly three months beginning in August, they enduredone of the world's most severe lockdowns.

"It was really hard," Barron said. "It was difficult to be at home all the time."

Overnight curfews were put in place. Residents could only leave homefor an hour at a time, and only within five kilometres. Masks had to be worn everywhere.

Now,Melbourne hasn't had any new cases or deaths from COVID-19 in more than two weeks and many of those restrictions have been lifted.

"There was just a kind of a quiet consensus that even though it was hard, that it was the right thing to do," Barron said.

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Calls to implement similar measures in parts of Canada, including British Columbia,have grown along with the exponential rise of cases across the country. Physicians have rallied under the hashtag #CovidZeroto bring the coronavirus back under control.

Dr. Anthony Chow, founding head of the University of British Columbia's infectious diseases division, agrees. Chow says current measures in Ontario and B.C. won't do enough to stop the spread of COVID-19.

"The current thinking [is]to just sort of get people to do the right thing. I just think it's too naive," he said.

"This is a pandemic. And if you want to do something, you have to take drastic action."

Support for B.C. approach

But some health experts say the restrictions in Melbourne were far too excessive, especially given some of the new understandingabout how the virus spreads.

Daniel Coombs, a mathematics professor at the University of British Columbia who models infectious diseases, says he's generally supportive of additional restrictions to bring down the province's climbing numbers.

However, Coombs says limits on outdoor activity and mandates to wear masks everywhere makelittle sense given that the virus doesn't spread as easily outside.

"I'm in favour of an approach where they close down environments where transmission can happen and also environments where it seems reasonable that transmission would happen," he said.

Coombs doesn't even think B.C. needs to return to the same restrictions put in place in March.

Instead, he agrees with Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry's approach to examine where transmission is happening and make adjustments as necessary.

'It would just kill some businesses'

Some health researchers also point out the potential harm some restrictions can bring.

A recent study found thatCanadians in quarantine are twice as likely to have suicidal thoughts. There would also be ramifications for businesses and the economy.

Anita Huberman, CEO of the Surrey Board of Trade, says B.C. can't afford another shutdown like the one in March, let alone one like they had in Melbourne.

"It would just kill some businesses," Huberman said.

In Australia, government compensation during the lockdown included support for businesses and workers that many agree was far more generous than similar security nets offered in Canada.

Huberman doesn't think governments here haveenough in their coffers to support a full shut-down.She thinks more needs to be done to enforce the rules already in place.

'There is no one playbook'

Tom Koch, a medical geographer at UBC who has writtenbooks on the history of epidemic and pandemic disease, agrees that a Melbourne-style lockdown would be overdoing it.

"Dr. Henry's getting a lot of criticism right now because the numbers have gotten so high," Kochsaid. "She has done, I think, an extraordinary job of containing this so far."

Koch says health experts around the world are facing the same problem humans have faced for millennia: how to co-exist with the virus while causing the least amount of damage.

And unfortunately, Koch says, the situation is too complex for easy answers.

He points out that many of the worst-afflicted communities, like Surrey, are also home to workers inessential sectorsthat can't be shut down. Nor can governments close the factories, long-term care homes and prisons where outbreaks are most likely to occur.

"The real take-home message is that there is no one playbook," Koch said. "People want a firm and easy answer. And the best we can give is a maybe."

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