A lack of information about where precisely COVID-19 cases are has caused residents in the Cariboo and across the province some concern.
Dr. Carol Fenton, a medical health officer with the Interior Health Region, said that she understands people’s frustrations about a lack of information.
“You hear all these recommendations on how to safe, but you don’t know how they apply to you because you don’t know someone personally who had it,” she said.
Fenton said that it’s a tough balance between protecting patients’ privacy and informing the public.
“You are seeing different things in the news, and it’s a really stressful time,” she said. “All of our lives have been turned upside down, so I can really understand the frustration, but one of the challenges in public health practics is we have to balance what needs to be done in order to protect the population.”
Fenton noted that it could cause risk to the person who tested positive if they give too much information.
“The need for privacy and the potential harms that we could cause if we do it wrong. When I say do it wrong, I mean if we stood up and were like X child in X school has COVID, so check your staff and see if you know them,” she explained. “That would cause a lot of harm to that person who tested positive and would drive people from getting tested, and we don’t want that. We need to strike that balance.”
“We are not trying to obscure the truth and make it more confusing, we are trying to be as transparent as we can, but we also need to protect those who have tested positive and encourage people to get tested when they need too,” Fenton added.
The BC Centre for Disease control breaks down the Cariboo region into three different areas, the Quesnel area, the Cariboo-Chilcotin area, and the 100 Mile House area.