Wednesday, April 29, 2020

A tale of two provinces with very different priorities

Ontario and Quebec are Canada's two most populous provinces, and far and away the most badly hit by COVID-19. Quebec in particular has over half of the national case-load, and well over half of the nation's deaths from the coronavirus (as of today, at any rate, and according to the statistics compiled by covid-19canada.com), although bear in mind that Quebec has a slightly different definition of cases, and it has done a lot more testing per capita than Ontario.
So, it's interesting to see the different approaches being taken by the two provinces as regards re-opening the economy.
Quebec, despite a continuing upward trend in new cases and deaths, is gung ho on opening up, despite the very public misgivings of the Quebec Director of Public Health, Horacio Arruda, who has called it "a risky bet", and offered the less-than-ecstatic qualification,"I hope not too many people will die". To be fair, it will be a modest opening up at first, with shopping centres, bars, sit-down restaurants, and personal services like hair salons, remaining closed for now. Plus, the changes will be rolled out in smaller comunities first, and then Montreal, the epicentre of Quebec's infections, later.
François Legeault's decision appears to be mainly on the basis that the vast majority of new cases and deaths are occurring in care homes and not in the general public, and the fact that hospitals are not yet overwhelmed, which seem like rather negative decision-making factors to me.
Ontario, on the other hand, is making no such moves, certainly not for the foreseeable future. Doug Ford (the new, responsible, prudent Doug Ford - see a fun article in the Beaverton that maintains that the real Doug Ford has been abducted by aliens, and what we are seeing now is a doppleganger) has revealed that Ontario does have a plan, or at least a "framework", but it is just a general guide to what might happen at some unspecified time in the future. It is, he says, more a "roadmap, not a calendar".
The plan is is three phases, of which we are very much still in Phase 1: Protect and Support, and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Phase 2: Restart also comes in three stages, a gradual and circumspect process that could take some time. Phase 3: Recover is a return to a "new normal", but even that includes strict health and safety guidelines, and a recommendation to pursue remote work arrangements where feasible.
Which is just fine by me, as an Ontario resident. I don't believe we are in a position yet to be making specific plans. We have no vaccine, antibody tests appear to be unreliable, and we still have limited testing ability anyway. Right now, I feel more comfortable with vague, non-specific roadmap than a risky, specific calendar. It may be callous, but I prefer to watch progress in other jurisdictions first, and to learn from their successes and failures. Because, make no mistake, there will be failures.

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