EDMONTON -- What Dr. Joan Robinson meant was COVID-19 is “not like measles where you can get infected simply by walking into the room where someone with measles was.”
But what she wrote in an opinion column published by Postmedia was simpler.
In the Aug. 19 piece titled “Alberta parents shouldn’t feel guilty about sending their kids back to school,” Robinson assured families that “it is exceedingly rare and maybe not even possible to acquire the (coronavirus) simply by being in the same room as an infected person."
However, after a day of public backlash, professional criticism, and reference of the column by both political parties, Robinson regrets not defining the difference more accurately.
“I’m saying I don’t think it’s very likely that you’re going to get the virus by walking into the room where someone was three hours ago that had COVID. I think if that happened, we would have way more cases than we have,” the pediatric infectious diseases physician told CTV News Edmonton.
“As long as you don’t touch anything other people touched and as long as you don’t go too close to them. Now as to how close is too close, we don’t really know. Two metres is recommended.”
The column addressed concerns over Alberta’s school re-entry plan, which is set to unfold in just a couple of weeks.
Robinson told readers the larger concern isn’t that children will become severely ill from the disease, but that they’ll infect other people who are in a more vulnerable health position.
That is why, she argues still, closing schools in March when experts had a foggier idea of COVID-19’s mortality and transmission rates made sense – but doesn’t as much now.
The essay was criticized as contradictory to other medical research on the transmissibility of COVID-19.
“I don’t endorse the way it came out,” the University of Alberta’s Dr. Lynora Saxinger told CTV News Edmonton.
She said the column made the science appear black and white.
On one hand, Saxinger said, the medical community is facing a “bigger grey zone than we are used to talking about” when it comes to COVID-19. On the other, she added, “I also don’t think this is predominantly an airborne disease.”
STATEMENTS TECHNICALLY ‘APPROPRIATE’: HINSHAW
Commenting Thursday, Alberta’s chief medical officer of health said she had understood, as a physician, what Robinson wrote, and that her “perspective would be very similar to mine.”
“Close contact ... is very clearly a part of COVID transmission and in fact probably the highest risk process for transmission,” Dr. Deena Hinshaw told media.
“I can simply say from my own perspective that the statements that this particular author made were, again, in my interpretation, of the more technical kind, appropriate.”
The scientific question at the centre of the debate is how long infectious droplets – or particles which could make someone sick – stay suspended in the air.
Canadians have been told to be cautious of large droplets passed through coughing, speaking or sneezing, which are a known transmission source but which are thought to fall almost immediately. Smaller particles can remain in the air longer, scientists have warned, and their potential to spread COVID-19 is lesser known.
Robinson issued a clarification to her op-ed Thursday, but not before it had been pulled into the political sphere.
The United Conservative Party Caucus republished part of the column on social media, even quoting the exact phrase which catapulted Robinson’s writing into the spotlight.
Meanwhile, the NDP accused Robinson of walking back her comments, and Premier Jason Kenney – who called Robinson’s column a “great read” – of irresponsibly endorsing contradictory advice and failing to give school staff and students a secure back-to-school plan.
And while Robinson heard from families who were relieved after reading the column, one peer went so far as to tell her she had ruined her career.
“I found it somewhat amusing, but of course it bothers me a bit,” Robinson said.
It was also surprising to have her opinion unintentionally turned into political fodder.
“Usually Jason Kenney and I are not on the same page on any given issue, but I think they like the idea that I support the decision to send children back to schools – because I feel strongly that was the right decision,” she said.
“My main point is even in a classroom setting, even if (children) get it, they’re probably not going to get very sick… The adults, sure. I think the adults are somewhat worrisome.”
The Alberta Teachers’ Association has called on the province to delay the start of classes until after Labour Day.
CUPE Alberta president Rory Gill told CTV News Edmonton he understood Robinson was trying to reassure parents, but that parents needed reassuring “because there is no plan.”
Edmonton public school students who are returning to in-person classes will be back Sept. 3, though the Alberta Teachers Association has asked for a delay to the start of the school year
The province has mandated mask use in Grade 4 and up, and by teachers and staff.
B.C. and Saskatchewan have both pushed back the first day until after the long weekend to give schools more time to prepare.
With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Dan Grummett
