RSV infections jump 800% in New Brunswick over last year
CBC
Respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, infections are up at least 800 per cent in New Brunswick, compared to last year, and the province is considering making it a reportable disease as cases continue to surge above expected levels among children across the country.
Forty-five New Brunswickers have tested positive for RSV, as of Nov. 12, based on data from the Dr. Georges-L.-Dumont University Hospital Centre laboratory in Moncton alone, the latest figures posted by the Public Health Agency of Canada show.
That's up from five positive cases as of the same time last year, according to the national respiratory virus report.
Of this year's 45 cases, 14 — more than 30 per cent — were during the week ending Nov. 12, known as week 45, up from zero that week in 2021-22.
The rise in RSV, which infects the lungs and respiratory tract, comes as the province faces an increase in the flu, on top of the COVID-19 pandemic, commonly referred to as a triple threat, or tridemic, adding further strain on the health-care system.
Although the province inputs RSV test data from the Dumont lab into the national surveillance system weekly, it's not a reportable disease in New Brunswick, unlike some other provinces.
That means it is not monitored or communicated to the public in the same way a reportable disease, such as COVID- 19 or the flu, with weekly reports, according to Department of Health spokesperson Adam Bowie.
If RSV was a reportable disease under the Public Health Act, "laboratory staff from all regional hospitals would have to submit the result to the regional public health team, where additional information would be collected about each case for analysis," he said in an emailed statement.
New Brunswick does not have RSV as a reportable disease, "in large part because … it is a very common infection that affects pretty well all children by the age of two," Dr. Yves Léger, the acting chief medical officer of health, told reporters Friday.
"But that act gets revised regularly and we'll certainly be looking at that in the near future to see if we should be considering adding that in," he said.
Adding to the list of diseases and events that are reportable in New Brunswick under the Public Health Act requires a regulatory amendment, said the department spokesperson.
The province recently added monkeypox to the list.
"Where an emergent public health emergency exists, the Public Health Act also provides authority for the minister or chief medical officer of health to make an order declaring a disease a notifiable disease," Bowie said.
In adults and older, healthy children, RSV symptoms are typically mild and cold-like, such as runny nose, cough and fever.
A man who terrorized women in St. John's in 2012 is now suing the federal government, saying he'll never walk again after being stabbed at a prison in Renous, N.B.
When help finally came for snowmobiler Dave Metcalfe, he'd almost given up hope it was coming at all.
The City of Montreal is asking residents to stay home as much as possible until Monday evening, as crews work to clear a second round of snow dumped on the city by Sunday's winter storm.
An internal government report warned a year ago that allowing "the trend of negative rhetoric" about the security of the Canada-U.S. border could lead to a thickening of the 49th parallel, adversely affecting trade and travel.
Saskatchewan RCMP says it's investigating three stabbing incidents on Big River First Nation.
Police in Surrey, B.C., say they have arrested a suspect believed to be involved in two unprovoked stranger assaults last week.
Liberal leadership candidate and former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney said on Sunday that former prime minister Stephen Harper asked him to join his cabinet as finance minister in 2012.
WARNING: This story contains details of experiences at residential schools.
The sudden closure of Yellowknife's Great Slave Animal Hospital has left both pet owners and animal care non-profits in the N.W.T. scrambling to find veterinary care.
Nearly the entirety of Alberta is in for a bout of frigid temperatures beginning Saturday, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC).
Seemingly never-ending snow, extreme cold, and a mix of ice pellets and freezing rain. Across much of Canada, it's been a nasty holiday weekend for weather.
A Sunday storm is brewing, and it's also set to usher in Islander Day with a mixture of snow, ice pellets, freezing rain and wind across P.E.I.
A winter storm warning has been lifted for London and Middlesex County as residents continue to dig themselves out from the region's second major snowfall in less than a week.