Premier Doug Ford said the provincial government is now considering a regional approach to reopening the economy — a move he has largely resisted until today.
Following an announcement of the province's expanded COVID-19 testing strategy, Ford said he's "now comfortable" asking officials to consider a regional model for reopening. The province entered Stage 1 of reopening on May 19, allowing several businesses such as retailers with street entrances to welcome shoppers into their stores.
"This will be one option we consider as we move into Stage 2...and we’re only able to do this now because we’re getting our testing to where we need it," Ford said, pointing to other jurisdictions that have taken this approach and saying he'd like to know how these models fared in those areas and what lessons Ontario could learn. Quebec is one province that has taken a regional approach, with officials deciding to keep elementary schools in Montreal closed until the fall, for example, while opening them up in other parts of the province.
According to the latest provincial data, 65.8 per cent of the 27,210 COVID-19 cases that have been reported in Ontario are in the Greater Toronto Area. And while Toronto Public Health has seen a rate of 317.5 cases per 100,000 people, the incidence in other regions has been much lower. The North Bay Parry Sound District Health Unit, for example, has seen around 19.3 cases per 100,000 people.
Asked about a regional approach on Wednesday, Ford said: "People travel, cottage country can see on a long weekend half a million cottagers go up to cottage country coming form the city, coming from the GTA. I always say we need to stick together, we need to work together as a province and I think we’re moving along fairly well." He made similar comments on Thursday.
As for what changed, Ford touted a team effort and pointed to testing.
"There’s never a lightbulb that goes off in my head...it’s about a team approach, everyone working together," he said. "This thing moves so quick, it’s so fluid from day-to-day-to-day, you have to be ready to make the changes...I’ve always been open to ideas."
The province reported that 18,525 tests had been processed on Thursday, an improvement from earlier in the week, but still shy of the province's capacity of 20,000 tests.
"The more testing that we do, the better idea we have of hotspots throughout the province," Ford said, thanking Ontarians for getting tested and adding that this can lead to further containment.
But he cautioned that nothing has been finalized on a regional approach.
"If the health table comes back and says there’s absolutely no way...I’m not going to go against the advice of medical professionals in this," he said. "Let me be very clear: I’m not prepared to take unnecessary risks when it comes to our health and safety. We will continue to take a measured, gradual approach to reopening based on the advice of our command table."
Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. David Williams said while many cases are around the GTA, there are some public health units in the province that have reported no new cases for a couple of weeks. He said as public health officials consider a regional approach there are many aspects to explore including how different regions would be organized and how any differences in reopening would be communicated.
"How do you interpret that to your decision-makers, that means your municipal officials, so you can communicate this in a way that the public understands and as they’ve done in some other areas, that they would respect each other’s jurisdictions and not overcome that and try to violate the regionalization and compromise the process," said Williams.
He said it gets complicated when there are two areas beside each other that are seeing big differences in terms of COVID-19 spread. Williams pointed to the efforts of local medical officers of health to create a more specific framework for reopening than what the province revealed in April.
"That’s why a number of our medical officers of health were looking ahead to say if you give us a target and we have to go below that, what kind of data can we collect locally to say why we’re not going to go all the way...but health units next to us or adjacent to us, if they’re different, how do we explain that to our public and our decision-makers at a local level?" he said.
Asked whether consideration of a regional approach would affect the timeline for entering Stage 2, Health Minister Christine Elliott said the "regionalization is a separate issue." Moving to the next stage will depend on the number of new cases, hospital capacity and adequate contact tracing, she said.
Reuniting families
The premier said he is supportive of any attempts by the federal government to reunite families that have been separated by the Canada-United States border restrictions.
The two countries agreed in March to limit non-essential travel across the border and that deal has been extended until June 21.
"I always want to keep a tight border and more screening at the border," said Ford, adding that he and the other premiers were told the federal government's efforts to reunite loved ones would apply to about 1,700 families.
"It’s so important that we reunite families, I think it’s absolutely critical…I support what the prime minister is recommending," Ford said.
Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his government has been looking at way to allow close family members like children, spouses or parents of Canadian citizens and permanent residents "to be able to reunite under strict conditions through a slight modification of the directives for the Canadian Border Services Agency."
He said while this wouldn't change the general approach to the border closures, it would be an attempt to see whether the government could "support families that are going through extremely difficult times."
Ford weighed in on what he'd like to see whenever the borders do reopen to non-essential travellers, saying "we really really have to ramp up screening, meaning no one gets through this border without screening and if they show symptoms, they get tested and then they self-isolate, and track them down to make sure they’re self-isolating, it’s absolutely critical we ramp up at the border."
Apologizing to families
Three days after a report from military personnel documenting horrifying conditions in five long-term care homes in Ontario, the premier was asked whether he is considering a formal apology to the residents of their homes and their families.
"My heart breaks and I apologize every single day," Ford responded, saying his government is "going to fix" the system.
"I said right from Day 1, I’ll take ownership of it, I’ll take ownership because I’m premier and the buck stops with me," said Ford, going on to pin blame on the previous government.
"I inherited a broken system that I’m going to fix now, with the help of medical professionals and we’re going to take care of it," he said.
He said while a number of homes were devastated by COVID-19, a majority of them have done an "incredible job."
The premier said he has no dollar figure for how much funding he'd like to see from the federal government to mend a sector that has seen challenges for a number of years.
"Yesterday in the conversation with the prime minister and the other premiers, he understands how serious this situation is in a couple of the provinces and it affects everyone and he’s committed to make sure he’s there to help the most vulnerable," said Ford of a call between Trudeau and the premiers.
Asked why Ontario isn't willing to cover the costs of overhauling the system for the province's seniors, Ford said the province needs financial support.
"They deserve it, they’re the ones who helped build Ontario, who helped build Canada, if there’s anyone who deserves, they deserve it," he said. "We don’t have the printing press that the fed government has and I’ll spend every penny we have to make sure people are taken care of."
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.