Dr. Eileen de Villa, Toronto’s public health chief, taking leave of absence for medical treatment in Rome when the province’s coronavirus tally swelled by 4,400 cases.
The Globe and Mail, Feb. 10, 2020:
The Globe and Mail recently revealed the details of a doctor’s treatment. The doctor, Dr. Eileen de Villa, had spent a week in Rome and was then rushed by Toronto Public Health (TPH) to a hospital there after she developed a fever and a cough.
After arriving in Rome on Wednesday, de Villa’s medical records revealed that she tested positive for the novel coronavirus, for which Italy has officially declared the disease a pandemic.
In a statement last Friday, Erika Gaudet of Humber College noted that Toronto’s public health chief, Dr. Eileen de Villa, was hospitalized in Italy in late January after suffering a fever and a cough for several days. This was followed by what appears to the Humber College to be a medical emergency in Toronto, when she was admitted to a hospital and treated with antibiotics for a respiratory ailment, according to a medical note taken by Dr. Eileen de Villa at the Toronto hospital.
The Humber College has released the following statement on Toronto’s public health chief, Dr. Eileen de Villa:
“Humber College is shocked and saddened by the news that a family medicine doctor in Toronto has contracted COVID-19 – a disease caused by the new coronavirus – and died,” said Dr. Jennifer Rennie in a statement released by the school. “Dr. de Villa graduated from Humber in 2017 and was well-established in the city. It is a great loss for her entire family and medical team.
“The university wishes her full recovery.”
Ontario’s public health agency, Toronto Public Health, immediately notified the Canadian Centre for Disease Control and the World Health Organization’s European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control on Jan. 23 that a Toronto-based family physician had tested positive for COVID-19, a disease caused by the coronavirus.
The Humber College has not yet released a list of members or employees of the family medicine department it has worked with Dr. de Villa to care for during her time in the hospital, but noted that the
