Canadians On The West & East Coast Act So Differently In A Pandemic & Here's What I've Seen

The west coast of Canada is different from the east coast in a lot of ways, including in how they treat the COVID-19 pandemic, I've noticed.

Rewinding to March 2020, I'm sitting in my car driving home to New Brunswick from Ottawa, where I was going to university. Like many people, I remember that first week so clearly. I thought I was going home for two weeks to flatten the curve. As we now know, it's lasted a lot longer than that.

As soon as I got home I realized that New Brunswick was not messing around. It wasn't long before our provincial borders were shut to the rest of Canada, and I couldn't go back to Ottawa to pack up the remainder of my stuff.

The Atlantic Bubble Effect

Luckily — probably because of the more serious restrictions — New Brunswick's case numbers remained low throughout the first part of the pandemic, while other provinces like B.C. were hit harder.

We had the 'Atlantic Bubble,' where we were exclusively open to Nova Scotia, P.E.I, and Newfoundland and Labrador.

Most of the country could travel from one province to the other without isolating, but not New Brunswick. It was stricter, but the Atlantic Bubble mostly worked (until it burst).

Fast forward to the fall of 2021, I moved to B.C., and I was a bit nervous coming from a small town without a huge threat of COVID, to the big city of Vancouver.

West Coasters Seem Less Phased

I'm not saying that people in B.C. don't take COVID-19 seriously, because they definitely do. Especially now, with the lack of tests available and the increased number of cases, the situation is being taken very seriously by many people.

But, I think that because they had been dealing with a higher number of cases throughout the pandemic in comparison to the Atlantic provinces, they were already more adapted to it than people on the East Coast. To me, it seemed like 'pandemic life' was more of a normality on the West Coast.

East Coasters Are Super Careful

Despite B.C. having more COVID-19 transmission risk, people seemed to be less phased by it. While New Brunswick had far fewer cases, people were actually more cautious there.

It was overwhelming, at first, to be even walk on the street with so many people. I remember going to my first yoga class in B.C., and being so shocked at how close others came to me. Everyone wore masks and followed guidelines, but there were small things like that which felt super strange to me.

This became even more clear as I went home again for Christmas, and the Omicron variant started spreading rapidly.

The cases are bad in both provinces, and B.C. actually has more restrictions.

New Brunswick has some restrictions, such as a 10-person bubble, but not very many in comparison to other provinces.

The strange thing here is that even if you do go out for dinner, the restaurants are pretty much empty. I've noticed this myself and have heard the same thing from friends — people are simply choosing not to go out, despite everything being open.

Similarly, if you go to the gym or to the mall, it's noticeably empty. Compare this to B.C. where you have some people online speaking out against the gym closures.

Why?

Of course, this is all just my observation, but it seems clear to me that some East Coasters are more outwardly cautious even if they have fewer restrictions. On the flip side, I've noticed that some West Coasters are more likely to follow restrictions and guidelines to a tee.

I believe this is because on the East Coast we were so used to having low numbers that when they spiked, more people self-regulated.

In B.C. on the other hand, they have more people and way bigger numbers so, of course in a bigger city like Vancouver, you inevitably are going to be more familiar with other people being around you.

I love both coasts, but it still manages to surprise me every time I notice these differences in behaviours between the west and east coasts.

Both New Brunswick and B.C. are dealing with high case counts right now and evolving restrictions, and I hope everyone stays safe, whatever coast they're on.