By RICHARD SAILLANT
Much has been said about the fact Canada does not seem so far to have a national response to fighting the spread of the novel coronavirus that is upending our lives from coast to coast to coast. Some have deplored it, others have simply noted that it is to be expected as a fact of life in our vast, diverse federation.
If anything, this debate should serve to highlight a critical point about how the global pandemic could play out across the country: although everyone is talking about the critical and urgent need to “flatten the curve,” the reality is that, depending on where they live, Canadians will be dealing with very different local, regional and provincial curves.
No one knows how the virus will progress across Canada and what the various curves of the country’s thousands of communities will look like over the coming weeks and months. What seems clear, however, is that the stakes involved in “flattening the curve,” although very high everywhere, will nevertheless not be the same across the country.
Why? Because COVID-19 produces more fatalities among older individuals, and the age profiles of Canadian communities and regions differ vastly.
Although much is still being learned about how the novel coronavirus affects those it infects, there is now strong evidence suggesting mortality rates are highest among older individuals. According to data reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, of the COVID-19 cases reported in the United States between Feb. 12 and March 16, 80 per cent of deaths were among individuals aged 65 or over. Data from the outbreak in China show similar results.
The aging of the baby boom generation is producing vast differences in the shares of seniors across the country. Despite all its recent travails, Alberta remains Canada’s youngest province. In 2019, the median Albertan was 37 years old and a bit over one in eight Albertans (13.3 per cent) was a senior. By contrast, in Newfoundland and Labrador, the median resident was 10 years older and a bit over one in five residents (21.5 per cent) was a senior. This means that, all else being equal, if Newfoundland and Labrador were to be hit just as hard as Alberta by the novel coronavirus, it would likely be faced with a much greater death toll.
Of note, Newfoundland and Labrador may be the oldest province in the federation, but the rest of Atlantic Canada is not far behind. In New Brunswick, 21.3 per cent of the population are seniors. In Nova Scotia, it’s 20.8 per cent. In Prince Edward Island, which has seen booming immigration for more than a decade, 19.7 per cent of the population are seniors.
After the four Atlantic provinces, Quebec comes next with a share of seniors of 19.3 per cent, almost two percentage points above the national average of 17.5 per cent. In short, the five oldest provinces in Canada are all east of the Ottawa River.
That said, to understand how demographics could affect mortality rates across Canada, one must not only look at differences across, but also within regions. Here, the contrasts are just as stark, if not starker.
Take, for example, Atlantic Canada. At the time of the 2016 census, Guysborough County in Nova Scotia had a median age of 55 and 31 per cent of its residents were seniors. By contrast, the median age in Halifax Regional Municipality was 41 and a little under 16 per cent of its citizens were seniors.
Similar divides can be viewed elsewhere in the region, whether between the northern and southern halves of New Brunswick, or between St. John’s and the rest of Newfoundland and Labrador.
There is another reason for Atlantic Canada’s greater vulnerability to COVID-19. The evidence available so far suggests that mortality rates are greater for individuals with one or more underlying conditions, such as cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, diabetes and hypertension.
Unfortunately, on this count, too, Atlantic Canada exceeds the national average, even once we take into account the fact that its population is older.
These are early days in the progression of the virus and the situation, to say the least, is extremely fluid. However, experts and world leaders are telling us that this pandemic will last until most people are immune. The objective of public health authorities in “flattening the curve” is not to stop the pandemic, but to avoid overwhelming local health systems and the higher mortality rates that will inevitably accompany such situations.
All Canadians need to heed the directives issued by public authorities to slow the spread of the virus and “flatten the curve.” Yet, while this will be critically important everywhere in Canada, it will be even more so in the country’s older communities and regions. From a demographic standpoint, Atlantic Canada finds itself in the eye of the gathering storm.
Richard Saillant is an economist and public policy consultant based in Moncton. He is the author of A Tale of Two Countries: How the Great Demographic Imbalance is Pulling Canada Apart (Nimbus).
