Quebec searches for staff to speed up boosters, cuts delay after second dose to just 3 months

Getting third vaccine doses will be crucial to fighting the looming Omicron wave, Quebec's leaders say, and as of today, one hurdle is out of the way for millions of people: the delay to get a booster will be only three months from the second shot, not six.

But with the province lagging far behind its neighbours in the third-dose rollout, authorities were also put on the defensive Thursday about why it's so slow.

"I hear people telling us, 'Well, why don't you just open it up to everybody 18 and over?" Legault said.

"We want to go in order of risk."

Ontario announced Wednesday that as of Friday, boosters in that province will be available to anyone 18 and over.

In Quebec's general population, meanwhile, only those 70 and older are currently eligible, with those 60 and older eligible in the coming weeks.

In his Thursday-evening emergency announcement to tighten public health rules, Legault acknowledged there's a need for more staff to give shots in Quebec, but he said that ultimately it's a strategic decision not to make them more available.

"If we did that tomorrow morning, to anybody 18 and over, that would mean that we might end up in a situation where somebody who's 40 might get ahead of somebody who's 70, who is a lot more vulnerable and at greater risk," he said.

"So just as we did the first dose last year," they'll go age group by age group, he said. 

PROVINCE RE-STAFFING VAX CLINICS

At the same time, Quebecers' uptake of boosters isn't as fast as the province wants it to be, said Health Minister Christian Dubé in the same announcement.

"It is time for people who are 70 and over to go get their doses very quickly," said Dubé.

"Up until a few days ago, we were below our capacity... We're not vaccinating at the max of what we could do."

Dubé said the schedule for younger groups could be moved up, but he admitted that scaling up manpower to give the shots is a key ingredient.

Quebec shut down some of its vaccination clinics in the fall and many of their staff left as second-dose coverage grew nearly complete and demand waned.

Now, the province is back to searching for qualified volunteers among retired, underemployed or other health workers, using its online portal called Je Contribue.

"We have 1,500 people who've raised their hand to help us out," said Dubé, and the health ministry is currently sorting through their applications to see who has appropriate training.

Health-care staff are also being pulled from other parts of the system to ramp up vaccinations again, he said.

The pace has picked back up: in the last 24 hours, 53,000 people got shots, numbers starting to approach the peak of the spring and summer's vaccination drive, when daily rates were above 50,000.

On June 30, the single highest day, 126,439 Quebecers got a dose.

The province is going to keep momentum going by allowing the next age groups to book appointments sooner, Dubé said.

On Monday, Dec. 20, people 65 and over will be able to book their slot on Clic-Santé, and on the 27th, those 60 and older will be able to do so.

He didn't clearly say that the first dates open to them will also be moved up, but he suggested the criteria are flexible, even urging people in their 60s with serious health conditions to try to get their booster now.

"If you are, for example, somebody who has asthma and who's 60, you can go get vaccinated," he said.

In January, all age groups under 60 will become eligible, he said, while repeating that the speed of the rollout will really depend on how many staff members the province can find to give the shots.

Just today, the province's public health experts recommended moving the booster delay from six months to a minimum of three months, Dubé said, which will suddenly make millions of people who got vaccinated over the summer eligible. 

"With the arrival of the variant, public health has decided that it is better to reduce that interval," he said.

BOOSTERS SUDDENLY 'OUR BEST WEAPON'

Omicron does widely infect the vaccinated, but experts are clear that having a third dose reduces the risk of catching the virus and, more importantly, developing serious enough symptoms to land in hospital, said Legault.

As with the first two doses, that's especially important for the elderly, whose immune systems are weaker than younger people's.

Boosters are also currently open to some health workers, to pregnant women, to immunocompromised people and some other small groups.

Dubé said that the thinking around boosters has changed very quickly as it became clear that double vaccination is less effective against the Omicron variant than it is against Delta. Triple vaccination is much better protection against Omicron, he said.

Ninety per cent of those infected by Omicron in Montreal so far are doubly vaccinated, the city's public health chief said this week.

But people shouldn't take this the wrong way, said Dubé -- the fact that Omicron is still infecting vaccinated people in large numbers is not what's important.

"People can't think that because you can catch the infection and transmit it, that the vaccine is no good," he said.

"On the contrary, if right now we didn't have the vaccines, our hospitals would be completely overwhelmed and people would be in ICU."