Before David Lee gathered with his parents for Christmas, he and his family took Covid-19 precautions. They isolated themselves a few days before meeting. His parents, who are more vulnerable because of their age, got the vaccine booster shot, as did Mr. Lee, 43, a photo editor who lives in Toronto. His children, ages 8 and 10, got their first vaccine shot. And they all took rapid tests leading up to the holiday.
“With all the different things added together, it felt like a relatively safe gamble to gather for the holidays,” he said.
Still, he wanted to be extra sure.
So a week before Christmas he used a Covid risk calculator he found on the internet. This one was created by Canada’s National Institute on Ageing, and it asked him questions such as how many people would be at the gathering, how old everyone is and whether everyone had been fully vaccinated.
He plugged in additional information about where they would be meeting (indoors or outdoors) and what they would be doing (talking, eating, singing, hugging). The calculator incorporated information about Covid rates and community spread in Toronto, where the gathering would take place, and then assessed his risk of being exposed to Covid-19 at the event.
