COVID-19 mortality rates are up in N.L., and reporting efforts are down, researcher says

Tara Moriarty is a professor and researcher at the University of Toronto. (CBC)

An infectious disease researcher says COVID-19 cases in Newfoundland and Labrador are on the rise again — and that it comes at a time when the province isn't showing the full picture when it comes to reporting statistics.

Tara Moriarty, a researcher and professor at the University of Toronto, told CBC News that COVID-19 cases are up across the country heading into the holiday season. And while Newfoundland and Labrador is in a slightly better situation, she said, her research indicates that about one in every 37 residents are infected by COVID-19.

"There are about 9,000 infections per week, or about 1,300 per day," Moriarty said Wednesday. "We also are expecting about 17 per cent excess mortality in Newfoundland and Labrador related to COVID, which is about 19 deaths per week."

Excess mortality related to COVID-19, measured by Statistics Canada, is calculated by estimating the number of cases in a province through methods like waste water testing and test positivity rate.

Using current and past data of excess mortality — the rate in which people die in untimely deaths each week — researchers can estimate how many of those deaths come as a result of COVID-19.

Data from the Public Health Agency of Canada suggests just 16.3 per cent of Newfoundland and Labrador's population has been fully vaccinated with the most recent vaccines.

"We've been seeing rapidly increasing excess mortality in fast reporting Canadian provinces including Newfoundland and Labrador since about July 1," Moriarty said.

"People are so undervaccinated that they're experiencing more severe outcomes if they are getting infected. I'm deeply concerned right now."

Long COVID prevalence is rising

Moriarty said the data also suggests the prevalence of long COVID has increased across the country, and that it's especially prevalent in people who have been infected multiple times.

"We expected some people would recover. But there's been so many infections in the last year or two years in Canada, that actually what we see is that the estimated prevalence of long COVID in the Canadian population has increased," she said.

This billboard in St. John's, featuring a warning about long COVID, is the first of a cross-Canada group. Moriarty said cases of long COVID are on the rise across Canada as people who were infected aren't fully recovering. (Submitted by Keith Muise)

While the province takes its lead from Health Canada on how to manage and support people who have long COVID, Moriarty also voiced concerns with how virus statistics are reported.

The Department of Health currently updates its respiratory virus dashboard each Friday, which includes stats from COVID-19 cases, influenza and other viruses like RSV. Data that isn't publicly shown is still collected and used in public health responses, Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Janice Fitzgerald told CBC News in November.

"Part of the issue is probably that Newfoundland and Labrador is not regularly updating its numbers, and so the total numbers that are reported are much smaller than they actually are," she said.

"It's been like this since the beginning for Newfoundland and Labrador."

CBC News asked the Department of Health for comment about Moriarty's concerns. It replied with an emailed statement from department spokesperson Laura Thomas.

The statement said the Canadian Institute of Health Information, which Moriarty used in her research, isn't the same data source the province uses in its COVID-19 reporting.

"The cases compiled for the CIHI report may or may not require care due to COVID-19. As such, the CIHI statistics are not intended to provide an estimate of the burden of severe COVID-19 cases among provinces and territories, but rather reflect suspect and laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 cases that are in hospital," the statement said.

"As part of standard, routine, infectious disease surveillance, Public Health monitors and reports hospitalizations, ICU admissions, and deaths, in which laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 is considered a primary or contributing factor. "

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