Omicron is filling up Canada’s hospitals. Your health issue might not qualify, doctors say

There's a risk that if Omicron COVID-19 cases keep trending upwards, emergency care — everything from a sprained wrist to a heart attack — could be impacted, doctors warn.

Five-year-old Rossy Hipkin was just one week away from a surgery that could have changed his life, according to his mom. That surgery might have, for the first time, allowed him to use his arms.

Then came the email: his Nov. 25 operation was cancelled because of COVID-19, a doctor wrote.

“It was hard. We’d been building him up, … telling him, ‘You’re going to get muscles’ and ‘You’re going to be able to use your arms,’ and things like that,” said Corina Heppner, Rossy’s mom.

“And then we have to say, ‘Well, you’re not going to get your muscle.'”

Facebook/Corina Heppner

Over a month later, Rossy still hasn’t had his surgery. And he’s not alone.

Hospitals across Canada have been forced to cancel and delay surgeries as COVID-19 cases fill up hospital beds and strain resources, according to doctors working on the front lines. There’s a risk that if Omicron cases keep trending upwards, emergency care — a hospital’s ability to quickly respond to everything from a sprained wrist to a heart attack — could be impacted too, according to Dr. Gerald Evans, an infectious disease specialist at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont.

“We’re all afraid that our ability to continue to do that emergent care is really, really being taxed by the staff absences and of course, the large influx of patients with Omicron.”