Front Burner - The year the pandemic changed the world

Episode Date: December 31, 2020

It’s been one year since Chinese officials in Wuhan confirmed they were treating dozens of cases of a mysterious pneumonia. Since then, we’ve watched the world transform as this new novel coronavirus accelerated into the COVID-19 pandemic, killing more than 1.6 million people and infecting more than 75 million. Today, CBC senior health writer Adam Miller and host Jayme Poisson look back on the long year of COVID-19.

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. So I was scrolling through old FrontBurner episodes the other day, and I came across the very first episode that we did on the coronavirus. It was on January 22nd. It's titled, As Wuhan Virus Spreads Fears About Pandemic Readiness. And listening to it now, it's like a time capsule.

We know that there is human-to-human transmission here, but we don't know for sure if it is sustained human transmission. And why is that a big deal? When you start to have multiple chains of transmission, that the person who was at the market then spread it to someone in their family, and did it stop there? Or did that person now spread it to the next person, and so on and so forth? It's also kind of eerie. At the time, there were only 300 reported cases and six confirmed deaths in the whole world. But our guest, Dr. Cameron Kahn, was confident the actual case count was higher. And he saw the potential for the outbreak to get much, much bigger. More than 50% of the world's population now lives in cities. You know, that

has so many benefits, but it's the perfect place for a virus to rapidly spread. We are dealing with climatic changes. We are dealing with billions of us boarding commercial flights and traveling around the world. He worried we weren't prepared for what was to come. I think we're just far too reactive. So we try and deal with and develop a solution during the middle of an

emergency when we should have spent the time planning for it, preparing for it, and making the appropriate investments in advance. Today, as 2020 draws to a close, we're taking a look back on a pandemic that completely changed the world over the course of one very long year. My colleague, senior health writer Adam Miller is with me. I'm Jamie Poisson. This is FrontBurner. Hi, Adam. So what a year to be a health writer, hey? Yeah, absolutely. It's been a year. A man in his 30s arrived in Tokyo with a cough and high fever.

The Chinese doctor who tried to warn the medical community has died. Coronavirus cases hitting 100,000. More than half a million. The mass grave in New York as the death toll continues to rise. Right, and then I see the disinfectant. And is there a way we can do something like that? Injection inside or... Boris Johnson is tonight in intensive care.

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro says he has tested positive. The world surpassing one million deaths. The President of the United States and the First Lady have both tested positive. Faces worldwide has passed 40 million. One in 1,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 this year. Let's go way back here, way back to the earliest days of COVID-19,

before it was even called COVID-19. And what were the first inklings that something was going wrong in China? inklings that something was going wrong in China. Yeah, so, you know, late December, we started to hear that there was this viral pneumonia outbreak in the city of Wuhan in this province, Hubei. The virus is thought to have emerged from this seafood market. It may belong to the same family of viruses that caused the deadly SARS outbreak. It looked concerning. There was reports that a lot of people were showing up in hospital.

I think at that point in early January we had like 59 people hospitalized with this and one person had died. So we didn't really know if this was something as serious as SARS. Local experts, however, are confident the situation can be controlled. All the identified new cases have been admitted to a designated hospital. We started to kind of look into it and realised pretty quickly that this was a pretty dramatic virus and that we also knew really nothing about it. Even if residents feel well, they could still be a carrier of the new coronavirus.

Officials within China, they are confirming that there has been human-to-human transmission of this virus. And what precautions has Canada put in place, Arthi? They say that they believe there's going to be a limited risk here for it to be spread. And so as January rolls on, I remember Wuhan and the surrounding Hubei province, they go into this like hardcore lockdown. Chinese authorities are effectively putting a quarantine on an entire city. And then there's these astonishing live streams coming out of like whole hospital being built to treat COVID patients in just 10 days. And then in early February, there was this big effort to repatriate Canadians from the region. The Canadian government has secured a plane.

Canada's second charter flight has now left Wuhan. Once they were finally flown out, they were kept in quarantine at these military bases in Trenton, Ontario, for 14 days. I remember the images on the tarmac there. While we're landing in Trenton, we feel we are safe. They do have rooms. Some have two queen-size beds. They can even go outside. They actually have four hours a day in rotations. But the thing that really sticks out in my mind from around that time was the outbreaks happening on cruise ships, right? Like the first big one that we heard about was the Diamond Princess.

And talk to me about what unfolded there. So this massive cruise ship, the Diamond Princess, had over 3,700 people on board. It was able to dock in Japan and Yokohama and was completely quarantined because it was determined that there was an outbreak. After 20 passengers tested positive. 39 more have tested positive for this new virus with the new name. Get used to hearing COVID-19. Since then, the number of infected passengers has quadrupled.

And, you know, it basically, we know that cruise ships are notoriously bad for infectious disease outbreaks. You know, there's a lot of common spaces, tight quarters, sharing of food, sort of buffet style. So, you know, we've heard about like norovirus and those types of outbreaks on cruise ships before. So it's kind of like the perfect storm happened on this cruise ship. So, you know, and at that time, it was the ship alone accounted for over half the cases of COVID-19 outside of China in the entire world. Right, right. And there were these interviews at the time of Canadians who were stuck on this cruise and others, and some of them were in these windowless cabins.

Lana Chan of Toronto has no daylight or fresh air, and this was just her second 60-minute outdoor walk in five days. You know, I think the biggest thing is we feel like we're sitting back, we're sitting here and people who are not even sick is going to be sick. And, you know, looking back on it now, what a grim signal these ships were of just how contagious this virus was, hey? Absolutely. I mean, the entire eyes of the world were on this cruise ship, watching this outbreak unfold, watching more and more people getting sick. It was really tragic, right? Like we saw hundreds of people getting infected. I think over 700 people got infected and 14 passengers died tragically, including one Canadian man in his 70s. You know, I think even some of the staff that had been brought in to bring food to these

people got sick. So it was like in real time unfolding and showing us how little we knew about this virus. In March, we started to get the sense that this was really rocking Italy, hey? Like the entire country went into lockdown. All stores except for pharmacies and food markets will be closed. Take a look at this. St. Peter's Square at the Vatican, empty. There were hundreds of deaths some days. Doctors were sounding the alarm about how overwhelmed our health care system was. They were having to make these devastating choices, I remember, about who received life-saving care. They're saying they now are having to approach patients almost like wartime triage. The message I want to give to every country is if you do not stop the spread

of the disease, your health system, no matter how good, how efficient, how modern it is, sooner or later will collapse because the number of patients is too high. Patience is too high. March was also when it really became clear that Canada wasn't going to escape this virus. Early that month, Canada reported its first official case of local transmission. The number that has health officials most concerned is one, a woman with no travel history. There's likely at least one other person out there, and we need to find them. And I remember there was this dentist conference in Vancouver.

Nearly 15,000 people went, and I don't think this language was really commonly used at the time, but it turned out to be the super spreader event. 44 cases were linked to this one conference, and one BC dentist who attended would eventually die from the coronavirus. Friends say the 64-year-old was in great health and enjoyed skiing with his two boys. He never missed a day of work. I missed more than he did in those two and a bit years that I worked with him.

And then on March 7th, B.C.'s Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry gives this emotional press conference. No, I think this is something that I'm very concerned about. I went through SARS. I've been through Ebola. I've been through the pandemic in 2009. And I just know how stressful it is for our health care system, for my colleagues and for families that are dealing with this. And I'm probably a little tired myself, but yeah. Within days, she announces Canada's first COVID death. And it's this terrible harbinger of what was to come. And our heartfelt condolences go out to his family and loved ones and also, of course, to the staff who provided him care.

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, he was a man in his 80s with underlying health conditions who died after an outbreak at the Lynn Valley Care Center in North Vancouver. And, you know, eventually that outbreak grew to 79 cases, 20 deaths. But it was really clear that this was going to be, you know, where Canada was going to get hit the hardest. This is where we were most vulnerable. And seeing this man, you know, hearing his story and how he died in this outbreak at this long-term care center, it was like, again, a huge wake-up call for Canada, I think. And it was a tragic, you know, sign of things to come. In addition, excuse me, in addition, one additional health care worker has tested positive for COVID-19.

There was this one particular day in March that I remember very clearly. And I bet a lot of people remember it. March 11th, the WHO declares COVID-19 a pandemic. We expect to see the number of cases, the number of deaths, and the number of affected countries climb even higher. Utah jazz player Rudy Gobert, tests positive. That's video from Monday at a press conference when Gobert was trying to joke around about the overreaction to the virus

touching every mic and recorder in sight. And then all of a sudden, the whole NBA season is canceled. Confusion as word came down last night. It was a game between OKC and the Utah Jazz, and it was stopped before it could begin. Tom Hanks announces that he's tested positive. Well, keep the world posted and updated. Take care of yourselves, Hanks. I do have to say, I think this made this real for a lot of people. And then it was like these floodgates opened,

right? Like the next day, it's revealed Sophie Gregoire Trudeau has tested positive. Sophie's symptoms remain mild, but we are following medical advice and taking every precaution. The Junos are cancelled. A few days after that, Canada essentially closes its borders. Remember when the prime minister was like... Canadian travelers should return to Canada via commercial means while it is still possible to do so. Let me be clear. If you're abroad, it's time for you to come home. And at that time in March, besides, you know, telling us to sing happy birthday while we wash our hands, I tend to sing

happy birthday because I like thinking that it might be my birthday today or any given day. Can you remind me what kinds of messages were coming from officials from our government? Right. So, I mean, again, this was a new coronavirus and we knew very little about it. But, you know, the instructions that we were getting at the time, you know, we were being told to, again, wash our hands. You know, masks weren't even really recommended. I think there was concern that there would be a run on, you know, medical masks for healthcare workers. Prioritizing supply in that setting is critically important. You know, it's easy to look back now and say, wow, we weren't really recommending enough. But,

you know, the WHO, the Public Health Agency of Canada, all these organizations were kind of going on limited information at that time. But at the same time, you look back now and you think, wow, some of these measures could have been really helpful, you know, and didn't require too much effort. Right, right. I remember at the time, you know, there were even messages that masking could be problematic. Like if you didn't know how to use a mask. The message in Canada is consistent. Don't bother. I would prefer that

people kept the two meters. People are not protecting their eyes or, you know, other aspects of where the virus could enter your body. And that gives you a full sense of confidence, but also it increases the touching of your face. There was just so much uncertainty, like run on toilet paper. Remember that? on a quick trip for essentials good luck it seems rather little bonkers in there now today people with like five six packages of toilet paper everyone was sanitizing like cereal boxes on their amazon packages yeah i mean that was another thing surfaces were this huge thing at the time where we didn't know if you were at risk from droplets, from surfaces, or from aerosols, like really tiny particles in the air.

So people were really concerned, and we didn't have much information. So you didn't know if you could order a pizza and get sick from your pizza box or your Amazon delivery or your letter in the mail. Looking back to an address by Prime Minister Trudeau on March 23rd, he started by saying, I want to begin by recognizing that a lot of people have now been stuck at home for a week or more because of COVID-19. If that's starting to take a toll, it's understandable. COVID-19. If that's starting to take a toll, it's understandable. And then he was saying it would be a few months probably before Canada could start relaxing restrictions. And I remember that hitting back then like it was a gut punch. And then he was saying, normality as it was before will not come back full on until we get a vaccine for this. And as you say, that could be a very long way off.

It is incredible how quickly this thing was moving. Hey, look, I have never covered a story that moved like this. No, absolutely. It just speaks to how, you know, we were learning on the fly. And so were politicians, right? And public health officials. And that's kind of what I shifted to as well in writing about this is like, looking at, you know, you don't always look at preprint studies and stuff that's not fully published yet. But the science was moving so quickly that you had to just get on top of this, you had to follow countless epidemiologists and infectious disease doctors from all over the world on Twitter, you had to dig through studies and preprints to try and figure out, okay, what the hell is going on here? How did this case happen? How did this guy at a restaurant in China infect, you know, several

other people, even though he was sitting so far away? Well, maybe it was because he was sitting under the air conditioning vent, stuff like that. Like we were writing about it and learning about it and seeing it unfold in real time. And it was really just stressing to me for so long, how little we knew. And I still feel that way. I don't fully think we have a full grasp on this. And it could be years until we do. In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. Hi, it's Ramit Sethi here.

You may have seen my money show on Netflix. I've been talking about money for 20 years. I've talked to millions of people and I have some startling numbers to share with you. Did you know that of the people I speak to, 50% of them do not know their own household income? That's not a typo. 50%. That's because money is confusing.

In my new book and podcast, Money for Couples, I help you and your partner create a financial vision together. To listen to this podcast, just search for Money for Couples. I help you and your partner create a financial vision together. To listen to this podcast, just search for Money for Couples. Earlier, we mentioned how Canada's first COVID death was this awful sign of the way this virus would devastate long-term care homes. And I remember in April, we were working on this episode about what was happening at one home in Pickering, Ontario. We'd heard that there were a few deaths there. And then within days, we got word that in fact, that number was 31. 31 deaths. And I remember thinking this had to be a mistake. In the end, more than 70 people died in that one long-term care home. And I don't want to lose sight of the people behind numbers like that.

People like Clara Burley's mom, Susie, who died just a few days shy of her 91st birthday. My mother was always a hard worker. She was a gardener and she loved to cook. She loved her grandchildren, so our two daughters. She was just all about family. And she was tough as nails. She was a short little Italian lady, but she could do anything. The deaths that we saw in long-term care were the biggest tragedy in the pandemic.

It was the biggest failure, right? If everything we had set out to do from the beginning was to protect our most vulnerable, we failed to do that. You know, we've had over 80% of our deaths were in long-term care in this country. And that's like well above the average for most developed countries. And hopefully we'll continue to learn to be able to protect these people better because it's just something that still to this day is the biggest, most heartbreaking part of this whole thing. Patients were drenched in urine and pee pee.

Their sheets were brown and black right up to their neck. The Canadian military sent soldiers in to help. That report, forceful feeding causing audible choking and aspiration. Cockroaches and flies present. Patients could be going weeks unbathed. I understand my father was old and he was going to die and you know but it wasn't supposed to go like this. We can't get alarmed at over 1,500 people dead. We should have been alarmed at one person dead because these

people are not statistics. They're our parents. They died without dignity. It's awful. So by the time the summer rolled around, it felt like we did have a bit of a reprieve. The weather was nice. We could have these sort of small, socially distanced picnics. Case numbers were fairly low. There was a day in August in Ontario where there were just 33 cases reported, which seems hard to imagine now. Restrictions were loosened. But looking back on it, do you think that we ever really flattened the curve? That's a great question. You know, I think we always knew that this pandemic was likely going to have a second wave. Most, if not all of the pandemics in history have had them. So there was a lot of speculation as to how we could avoid one, you know, what precautions we

needed to take. But yeah, so in the summer, as things sort of cooled off, a lot of people were saying we needed to boost our testing capacity and, you know, our isolation facilities and our contact tracing so that we could get a handle on these cases when they likely ramped up again. And obviously we did see some of that happen, but clearly it wasn't enough. It became clear, you know, when you looked at the numbers as they started to pick up again, that we had very little of a handle on where people were getting sick, right? There were a lot of cases just coming from the community with no known link to, you know, another infected individual or, you know, someone who traveled or someone, you know, in the same household or someone else. We just didn't know where people were getting sick. So once that sort of ramped up and we were, you know, reopening, we kind of were flying blind because we didn't know where people were getting sick. So once that sort of ramped up and we were, you know, reopening, we kind of were flying blind because we didn't know,

you know, exactly where this was coming from and how to prevent it from getting out of control. So we kind of watched again in real time as things started to slowly pick up again. And then as the summer drew to a close and, you know, we switched into the fall, it was clear pretty quickly that things were getting out of control. Right, right. And on September 23rd, you know, Trudeau gave this address to the nation where he said, It's all too likely we won't be gathering for Thanksgiving, but we still have a shot at Christmas. Here we are.

And this holiday season is not like any that I think any of us would have hoped for, with much of the country still under some sort of lockdown. And I don't need to remind anyone here how tough the second wave has been. We're still living through it. We're seeing record-breaking case counts in some provinces right now. Ontario has reported yet another record 2,553 today. And, you know, we haven't even had the chance to talk yet about our neighbors to the south in the U.S. whose daily death toll has been surpassing the death toll from 9-11.

As parents, you never expect to see your daughter in a coffin. You never expect to see your daughter in an emergency room with her eyes wide open staring at the ceiling dead. But look, I want to end on a better note here because there has been some hope on the horizon with the vaccine. And it is remarkable. We've talked about an entire year of a pandemic here. And all through it, scientists around the world have been working to create a vaccine. And so I was wondering if we could go back and end with where we started, you know, in that very first coronavirus episode we did with Dr. Cameron Kahn in January. He said. It's 17 years since SARS and we don't have a vaccine. So unlike an influenza pandemic where we could develop a vaccine, I think we're unlikely to have a vaccine available anytime in the foreseeable future.

Take me back to those early days of the pandemic, those early days of 2020, what the prospects of getting a vaccine actually looked like. Yeah, we, you know, when we look back at those early days, some of the predictions were like maybe a year, 18 months. some of the predictions were like maybe a year, 18 months. The fact that we've been able to study, put these vaccines through phase three clinical trials, produce them, distribute them, get them into the arms of people before the year is even done. It's remarkable. It's like nothing short of amazing. And, you know, to go back to the beginning, the reason that we do have these vaccines really comes down to the early days. I think it was in the first week of January, there was a group of Chinese researchers who released the genetic sequence of this coronavirus online to researchers all over the world. And that basically kicked off this vaccine race. This,

you know, people were looking at everything from therapies to what types of vaccines could this coronavirus be susceptible to. And today, I mean, we've got people getting injected and immunized by this vaccine that was created less than a year ago. It's absolutely fascinating. And it is because of that sharing of information. What's remarkable is just that the vaccines came when they did, because if we didn't have those right now, you know, we would not be in a situation where we'd be having any sort of hope, you know, cases are out of control in this country and in the States as well. We're at levels of hospitalizations and ICUs right now that we haven't seen since the beginning of the pandemic. So

it's just absolutely remarkable. I can't understate it enough that, you know, we are so fortunate that this worked. I actually can't really wait for it. Right. I know. I can't wait for it too. On that note, Adam, thanks so much for walking me through everything today and for coming on so many times this year to help break down this incredibly, everything today and for coming on so many times this year to help break down this incredibly, incredibly, as we said, fast moving, overwhelming, complex story. And I'm wishing you a very happy holidays and a very happy new year. And we'll see you in 2021. Thanks, Jamie. I really appreciate it. It's my pleasure and happy holidays. all right that is all for this year thank you so much for listening to front burner this year it's been such a pleasure um we'll talk to you again in 2021 and wishing you all

a very very happy new year. Thank you.