Ontario's chief medical officer of health recommended on Monday that child-care operators across the province close their centres to limit the spread of COVID-19.
Dr. David Williams' recommendation for these centres, which he made alongside another to cancel all gatherings of more than 50 people, came after increased calls for the Ontario government to mandate the closure of all child-care centres to prevent further spread of the disease that has increasingly seen world leaders urge the practice of "social distancing."
While the provincial government ordered public schools last week to close for two weeks following March Break, it hadn't issued a similar directive for child-care centres — something the NDP, child care advocates and a former deputy minister of education said was problematic and would result in a "patchwork" child-care system across Ontario amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Asked whether the government would consider a province-wide directive on child-care centres, spokespeople for both Health Minister Christine Elliott and Education Minister Stephen Lecce said on Monday morning that they would "continue to rely on the medical and scientific expert advice of Dr. Williams."
"Should Dr. Williams recommend further steps to protect public health, we will take immediate action to ensure the safety of students, education workers and parents," they said.
By Monday afternoon, Williams had issued the recommendation, an indicator of how quickly the situation around COVID-19 is changing. He also recommended that bars and restaurants close — something he didn't suggest when asked on Monday morning.
"I think that’s good, I think that’s the right call," said Carolyn Ferns, the public policy and government relations coordinator for the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care (OCBCC).
Ferns, who has been advocating for the closure of child-care centres amid the COVID-19 crisis, said she hopes there is some follow-up from the ministries involved to issue a memo to operators and do "all they can to ensure child-care operators are closing."
She said while she thinks most operators will follow the recommendation, there are other issues that need to be worked out and require co-ordination including how centres will pay staff or how families will be reimbursed.
"We need a co-ordinated plan for that to happen," Ferns said, calling on the provincial government to take the lead on this.
Quebec recently announced it was closing schools and daycares, but the province has opened emergency child-care centres for parents who provide essential services including health care workers and emergency response personnel.
Asked whether Ontario would consider this and what should be done about the children of essential workers, Williams said "it's a good question."
"That's why we had initially kept them open, or tried to, and knew it was very much (for) the local organizations, the private owners as well as the boards of education…to see if they could leave them open to assist in that regard," Williams said.
He said if child-care for essential workers becomes an issue, he would "look at ideas and alternatives that would assist especially to ensure that our essential staff can report to work and continue to serve our health system."
"It’s going to be (based on) very much assessing and reviewing and coming up with ideas and directions on that," Williams added.
The OCBCC and the Association for Early Childhood Educators of Ontario launched a petition this weekend "calling on the Province of Ontario to immediately provide a clear public health directive to close all licensed child care programs, including community-based child care centres that are located outside of schools." The petition had received around 7,000 signatures by Monday morning, according to Ferns.
As part of the provincial government's March 12 announcement to close public schools until April 6, Premier Doug Ford, Elliott and Lecce said at the time that "the health and well-being of Ontarians is our government's number one priority."
"We recognize the significant impact this decision will have on families, students, schools, as well as the broader community, but this precaution is necessary to keep people safe," the three officials said in a statement.
A memo from Williams following the announcement did not include a recommendation for child-care centres to close. Williams instead said he was "asking all licensed child-care centres to actively screen children, parents, staff and visitors for any symptoms and travel history that may be related to COVID-19 based on the ministry’s case definition."
"It is critical that we keep COVID-19 out of our child-care spaces," wrote Williams.
The following day, Shannon Fuller, the assistant deputy minister for the Ministry of Education's early years and child care division, issued a memo to child-care operators saying that the ministerial order to close schools "does not apply to child-care."
"School Boards will be making decisions on whether child-care centres in schools will remain open or will be closed," Fuller said, then referring to Williams' call for other licensed child-care operators to screen children and visitors.
Ferns said many child care operators interpreted this memo to mean "stay open, this is your responsibility to monitor children."
The Toronto District School Board (TDSB) announced on March 13 that it would be closing all child-care centres within its schools from March 14-April 5.
TDSB spokesperson Ryan Bird said the decision was consistent with the ministerial directive and made "in the spirit of trying to ensure that we are not putting large groups of people together, particularly children and trying to prevent the spread of the coronavirus." This, he noted, was echoed by the City of Toronto which said on March 13 that all city-operated child care centres would close and that the city's medical officer of health was recommending "all licensed child-care centres in Toronto close."
The city noted that Toronto's licensed child-care system includes more than 1,000 centres and 18 home child-care agencies, with the city operating 47 child-care centres and one home child-care agency.
"The fact that schools have been closed, school-based child-care centres have been closed, we're being told that social distancing is important and yet there hasn't been a ministerial directive to close community-based child care programs is a real problem," said Ferns before Williams' recommendation on Monday afternoon, adding that she thinks this was "irresponsible" and the government should temporarily close all child-care centres "as soon as possible."
She noted it would be harder to get young children to "cover their coughs," for example, and that there needed to be a shift toward "limiting" group care situations.
Ferns acknowledged, however, that closing child-care centres would raise several important questions such as the child-care needs of people working in health care or emergency response teams. She said Ontario should follow Quebec's lead and have emergency child-care set up for workers who need it. Several provinces including Quebec, Nova Scotia, PEI and Alberta have made moves to close child-care centres in recent days.
"There should be emergency child-care, but what we have right now is sort of the worse case scenario," said Ferns on Monday morning. "If you’re an ER doctor and your child care is in a school, it's closed, if you’re a worker who maybe is going to be working at home for the next few works but you go to (specific daycare), it’s open today, how is that making any sense? There needs to be co-ordination so that the families that really need child-care are getting it, but that other families that can practice social distancing as much as possible are doing that."
NDP MPP Doly Begum took to Twitter on March 15, saying a "patchwork approach won’t work. We need a plan for ALL child care centres to tackle COVID-19, including community-based programs & home child care. ECEs, parents & child care workers must be compensated, paid sick days restored & child care provisions made for healthcare workers."
A patchwork approach won’t work. We need a plan for ALL child care centres to tackle COVID-19, including community-based programs & home child care. ECEs, parents & child care workers must be compensated, paid sick days restored & child care provisions made for healthcare workers pic.twitter.com/6fs5JMC8qI
— Doly Begum (@DolyBegum) March 15, 2020
She wrote a letter to Lecce outlining her concern that community and home-based child-care operators had not received "clear direction" on what to do.
Meanwhile, Charles Pascal, a professor with the University of Toronto's Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, welcomed Williams' announcement on Monday afternoon, saying "better late than never."
Pascal, who is also a former deputy minister of education, voiced some concern earlier in the day about what appeared to be hesitancy from provincial officials about closing restaurants, bars and child-care centres.
"If you’re worried about making a tough decision that turns out to be wrong, they’re going to miss the window of opportunity for containment so the child-care thing is part of a larger issue," Pascal said.
"Do I think it’s wise to shut down child-care centres and schools? The answer is yes," he said. "We have to be ultra-safe in terms of the virus’ impact notwithstanding the tremendous inconvenience."
Pascal said he didn't think the government should leave it up to people to decide whether or not to close bars, restaurants or child-care centres and that "it should be mandated" instead.
He added that while many parents and guardians are thinking about what to do with their kids who will be at home for the next few weeks, "necessity is the parent of invention and there’ll be a lot of creativity regarding things like how will students continue to learn."
Photo Credit: Andrew Francis Wallace/Toronto Star
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