1) Despite the undeniable fact Montreal is still in the throes of the #COVID19 pandemic, the city observed some faint signs of progress on Friday. In this thread, I will point out the modest improvement while highlighting the challenges that remain.

2) Although the #coronavirus continues to ravage nursing homes (CHSLDs) and seniors’ residences in Montreal, for the first time on Friday there were no additional outbreaks in days. The number stands at 114 outbreaks, with slight increases in cases in some facilities.

3) Top on the minds of most people is knowing whether the epidemiological curve is flattening in Montreal, Canada’s #COVID epicenter. In the chart below, the orange light is flat after three days of cases in the 500-range.

4) Let’s hope this becomes a trend that holds. The only caveat is that authorities carried out new 3,252 #COVID tests since Thursday, about half the average from more than a week ago. We also don’t have testing figures for Montreal.

5) An examination of the spread of the #coronavirus across Montreal shows it might be stabilizing in the hot spot of Côte-Saint-Luc (up only three cases since Thursday). However, the virus is volatile and surging in other places, which I've marked with arrows in the chart below.

6) The city’s hospital emergency rooms are much busier than they were two weeks ago, but tonight they’re not as overcrowded as some physicians and nurses feared. Three ERs are filled to beyond capacity rather than six on Thursday. But again, this can worsen quickly.

7) At the Jewish General Hospital, Montreal’s main #COVID treatment centre, 14 people were in the intensive care unit for the respiratory illness, down from a high of 29 a few weeks ago. The total number of hospitalizations has stayed the same for the past three days.

8) Meanwhile, the city’s death toll from #COVID climbed by 67 to 808, still a horrific number, but down from the high of 94 deaths on Thursday. Experts are telling me we can expect more deaths in the days to come, the inevitable result of the nursing-home outbreaks.

9) Public health officials have revised downwards the number of #COVID deaths in hospitals from 22 on Thursday to 10 on Friday. The number of deaths at home has also been lowered from 89 to 80. On the other hand, the number of deaths in the unknown category almost doubled to 83.

10) What this all demonstrates is our understanding of the #pandemic in Montreal is only as good as our data collection, and that must improve, along with the #COVID testing. The data also suggest that the situation is very fragile.

11) Hospitals must maintain a delicate balancing act of loaning out staff to overwhelmed CHSLDs while treating #COVID patients and preventing outbreaks on their own wards. And they can’t ignore their cancer and heart patients.

12) At the Jewish General, the management team was tackling this very problem on Friday afternoon: how to ramp up the volume of surgeries (mostly for cancer) from the current 25% to full volume, while maintaining the hospital’s urgent #COVID mission.

13) And as Premier @francoislegault unveils a plan next week on how to reopen Quebec slowly, there’s still much that’s unknown about #COVID — from news of strokes in people in their 30s in the U.S. to the risks of possible re-infection. On that note, stay safe. End of thread.