COVID-19 Update Aug 13, 2020
A Note to our Patients from Dr. Jeff Shnall (Beech Dental)
You may have read in the papers or heard on the news in the last day or two that the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently updated their guidance for dental treatment.
They recommend that in areas of high community spread of the Covid-19 virus, dental treatment should be limited to emergency treatment only.
This information is nothing new. Ontario dental offices were essentially shut down from March 15th to June 1st for this reason, as Ontario was experiencing about 600 new cases of Covid-19 infections per day. During this time most offices and businesses were also on lockdown by the province.
Ontario is now fortunately in Stage 3 of Covid-19 management, meaning that community spread of the virus is low enough that many of the places in Ontario that were previously on lockdown have been allowed to reopen (i.e.dine restaurants and bars, hair salons, etc) as long as they take certain precautions i.e masks, social distancing.. This has included dental offices for the last few months.
Unfortunately there are places in the world that are still experiencing high rates of virus transmission such as the United States, Brazil and Mexico. Canada does not fit this profile.
In Ontario dental offices follow the guidelines of the Chief Officer of Health and dentists are fortunately permitted to practise all phases of dentistry on patients who test and/or screen negative for the Covid-19 virus.
The Ministry of Health is keeping a close watch on the number of daily cases of Covid-19 in the province.
If the number of cases spikes again i.e. we enter a second wave, dental offices again may only be allowed to offer emergency treatment only, as was the case from March 15 to June 1.
If there is any change in guidelines from the Chief Officer of Public Health Of Ontario you will likely hear about it in the news and certainly will receive notification from our office.
So in conclusion, the latest statement from the WHO and CDC applies to communities that are experiencing a high daily rate of new Covid-19 cases only.
Please feel free to contact our office if you have any questions or concerns.
I hope you enjoy the rest of your summer.
Best regards,
Dr. Jeff Shnall
Beech Dental