Regina doctor says more vaccine mandates required

The federal government needs to put even more vaccine mandates in place, according to a doctor in Saskatchewan.

This comes after the Canadian government unveiled its mandatory vaccine policy Wednesday, meaning travellers, all public servants and air travel and railway workers must have received their COVID-19 shots by the end of October.

Dr. Alex Wong, an infectious disease physician in Regina, joined the Greg Morgan Morning Show on Thursday.

He believes more mandates are needed for people choosing to stay unvaccinated, adding it’s the key to lowering cases of COVID in Saskatchewan ICUs.

“Some people are not going to be super happy to hear this, but we just need to keep expanding the mandates,” Wong said. “I think that means moving away from allowing some sort of negative test option in the not-so-distant future to access non-essential activities, or occupational considerations.

“I think more mandates will be put in place to make it less convenient and more difficult to be unvaccinated. I think this is going to be something that’s going to carry on indefinitely.”

Wong believes people faking vaccination cards is a real issue, so he wants more businesses to get on board with the QR system sooner rather than later.

“I’ve seen people that are selling these things as blanks, essentially; you can fill in whatever you want,” he said. “For a few weeks while we kind of figure all this stuff out it’s fine, but we’re going to have to move to a better system where you can’t just basically buy a card on the internet and fill it out as you please.”

Wednesday was the fourth straight day in which the province set a record for COVID-19 hospitalizations.

In Wednesday’s update, the Ministry of Health said there were 356 COVID patients in Saskatchewan health-care facilities. That number had risen from 306 on Saturday to 321 on Sunday to 325 on Monday and to 340 on Tuesday.