Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says he has COVID-19 — again.
In a tweet on Monday morning, Trudeau announced he has again tested positive for the virus and is isolating, but said he felt “OK.”
Trudeau previously tested positive for COVID-19 in January as the Omicron variant surge sent case counts across the country soaring to new highs.
He is triple vaccinated.
Recurring infection from COVID-19 has become more common over recent months as a result of Omicron and the more recent sub-variant, BA.2. Both are immune-evasive, meaning the virus has developed enough mutations to escape some of the immune response gained from vaccination.
Vaccination previously was highly effective at preventing infection and transmission of previous variants of COVID-19, including the Delta variant that dominated the summer of 2021.
However, the emerging reality of repeated infection by Omicron and immune-evasive variants does not mean the vaccines do not work. The vaccines remain highly effective at preventing severe outcomes such as death and hospitalizations that overwhelmed healthcare systems in many parts of the world earlier in the pandemic.
“The Omicron variant, in particular, seems to be one that will re-infect people over and over again,” Kelly McNagny, professor of medical genetics at the University of British Columbia’s school for biomedical engineering, told Global News last month.
“It’s a little bit more like the common cold virus that tends to infect the upper airways, which is a place where you tend not to develop strong immunity easily.”
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau tested positive for the virus in the early months of the pandemic.
Trudeau and two of his children caught the virus at the end of January 2022, while former Conservative Party leader Erin O’Toole and his wife, Rebecca, tested positive for the virus in September 2020.
For the past week, Trudeau was in Los Angeles for meetings with hemispheric leaders at the Summit of the Americas, where he emphasized that the pandemic is not over even as many jurisdictions lift public health measures. On Thursday, he met with U.S. President Joe Biden.
Trudeau returned to Canada on Friday.
Canadian reporters travelling with the prime minister during his attendance in Los Angeles at the Summit of the Americas noticed that he sounded hoarse on both Friday and Saturday. Trudeau, in remarks to reporters Friday, chalked it up to “a bit of a hard work over the past few days.”
He is scheduled to head to Germany for the G7 Summit on June 26, though it is unclear whether the positive test will impact those plans.
With a file from Global’s Irelyne Lavery and David Akin.