In early March 2021, the small city of Prince Rupert in northern BC was still suffering from the New Coronavirus, with 117 people contracting it each week, but just one month later the number of infections here had dropped to single digits, simply because of mass vaccination, which is now one of the highest vaccination rates in Canada, with an adult vaccination rate of 85%.
According to globalnews, in mid-March 2021, this city of 12,000 people became a hotspot with the highest infection rate in BC, with 33 residents and 24 staff members infected at the Acropolis Manor seniors’ home alone, ultimately killing 16 people.
To stop the spread of the virus, BC began vaccinating all adults in Prince Rupert on March 15. In just over a month 85% of the population was vaccinated and since then the number of new infections per week has dropped from 117 to just 3 and the virus is almost extinct.
Now that Prince Rupert has slowly begun to return to life as it was before the outbreak, the city’s mayor says, “Vaccination is the most effective act against the epidemic!” City Councillor Blair Mirau told the media that mass vaccination is a long way off, “It’s hard to predict what might have happened if we hadn’t been identified as a priority for vaccination in this way.”
Mirau said the number of new COVID-19 cases plummeted after more than 85 per cent of eligible people were vaccinated, and that vaccinating hot spots is indeed a proven strategy.
According to BC Centre for Disease Control statistics, Prince Rupert saw a peak of 117 new cases per week between March 7 and 13, dropping to just three cases per week between April 11 and 17.
B.C. doctors are encouraging all eligible Ontarians to get vaccinated as soon as possible.
As of Friday, more than 28 per cent of British Columbians had received their first dose of the vaccine.
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