An official with the COVID Alert Task Force says downloads of the app designed to alert Canadians if they’ve been exposed to the virus that causes COVID-19 are expected to have hit five million this week.
Director General Lucie Vignola said she was only waiting on data from Apple’s App Store to confirm the number.
Vignola added that new features on the app provide a more accurate timeline as to when someone was most contagious.
When a person volunteers to enter a one-time digital code when they test positive, they now have the option to indicate when they got the test and when they first experienced symptoms.
”Instead of going 14 days back to alert people, it will alert people from the three-day-back portion (from symptoms),” Vignola said in an interview Monday.
Five million out of a population of more than 35 million may not seem like a lot, but Vignola said there’s no specific threshold they have to meet.
“What we’re looking for is as many users as possible, in the sense that every download counts,” she said.
She said the app, which costs nothing to download, is simply another tool against spread of the virus.
I personally use it to protect my kids and my mom because she’s elderly,” Vignola said.
Two provinces — British Columbia and Alberta — have still not come on board with the COVID Alert program. B.C.’s chief medical officer has said the app doesn’t provide enough information to be useful.
My results came back negative this morning. Again, my thanks to our tremendous health care professionals. If you don’t already have the #COVIDAlert, download it today and help stop the spread of this virus. https://t.co/XQSn3gkEjK
— Chrystia Freeland (@cafreeland) November 1, 2020
However, the launch of COVID Alert was collectively endorsed by the country’s privacy commissioners only because no personal information or locational data is collected by it.
Vignola said privacy concerns prevented her from providing a breakdown of the app’s uptake by province.
The app has seen some real-time action.
On Sunday, Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said on Twitter she tested negative after the alert sounded on her phone the day before. Earlier in October, Trade Minister Mary Ng also tested negative after receiving a notification.
A curling tournament in Kitchener-Waterloo was called off last month after one of the players received a notice while on the ice.
