BristolUK

Gulp.

As a province, NB numbers are still low. But up in the north there have been two areas - both on Quebec borders - that have posted much higher figures. One seems to have recovered but the other - also sharing a border with Maine is consistently posting double figures.

One of the Health authorities (the French one) just announced emergencies only for the next week at two of its hospitals, one of them in Moncton where there's not much of a problem.

I think there's a clue today with reference to record numbers of ICU patient admissions for the second day running in that area. That's a record for the province as a whole in that area alone. Twice. And the news report refers to imminent transfers...presumably the French hospital in Moncton is ready to take some.

The variants are involved, of course.

scrubbedexpat091

Climbing everywhere with the variants it seems.

printer

And even though that doctors tweet says "don't travel" people most certainly are. There seems to be a very lax message regarding travel of any kind from those that are supposed to be guiding us.
This pasted from an article about visitors to Osoyoos over Easter and even the mayor is not telling people to stay away as last year just "follow advice" and "be careful"Last year, Osoyoos mayor Sue McKortoff told people that were planning to come to visit to stay home and wait.

“I went on Global and CBC and said, ‘please don't come to Osoyoos this weekend, we would prefer that you wait. We would be happy to welcome you when it's safe to do so.’”

This year McKortoff is not sending out the same message but, is asking people to understand guidelines if they plan on coming.

“I understand a lot of the hotels are full, I've had a few calls myself from people from outside of British Columbia saying, ‘we have plans to come and stay in Osoyoos...we're just not sure whether we should come here.’ And I said ‘I can't tell you that you can't come but I would suggest that you look at the provincial guidelines, look at our town's website.’”
It even goes on to say that they realize people have holiday properties there and want to stay or check them out like that is an acceptable reason. It seemed pretty clear to me that tourists were in Kelowna this weekend and i fully understand the tourism sector is in dire straits and needs visitors but it also seems our chiefs are not on the same page as some doctors and medical advisors.

BristolUK

That's probably a fair summing up.

If you want to travel it's probably not difficult to find something someone said to justify travelling. If you don't think someone should travel, likewise it's easy to find something someone said to justify that too.

But we've all seen Jaws haven't we? Against all sensible advice, the Mayor wanted to keep the beaches open.

Why would people listen to a mayor over the opinion of the experts?

scrubbedexpat091

Seemed to be plenty going to the island as well, and people who live in smaller communities on the island complaining about out of town folk visiting.

As long as it's just a travel advisory which it is, and there is no penalty or enforcement people will travel.

Some have argued it's not just an advisory however on the government website if you read through the website on restrictions, the travel advisory is at the bottom, above are the PHO orders & Emergency Program Act order for masks (the PHO never has actually mandated masks, it was the Minister of Public Safety & Solicitor General who ordered masks be worn.

However if you go through the page, the actual orders all link to a pdf of the order, and the website lists penalties from breaking said orders.

The travel advisory has no pdf copy of any order, lists no enforcement actions and no penalties, and says At this time, all non-essential travel should be avoided.

To me the travel advisory isn't a legal order that is enforceable the way it's worded on the website, and the lack of any enforcement is a pretty good sign its not a legal order, and if it were a legal order prohibiting it, why did they not link a copy of the order like they did for the other orders?

https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/c...o/restrictions

scrubbedexpat091

People during this time should have an option to not go to their workplace and not lose pay when there are co-workers who are ill.

Husband caught COVID at work, his wife and daughter caught it from him, and his wife in her 40's died. One of the variants.

https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/ontario-w...says-1.5374029


"He was told to go work at this factory and he got COVID, so did everyone else on his shift, and they got the variant," Warner said Sunday. "It got brought home, their daughter got COVID and his wife got COVID."

caretaker

On Saturday our Regina drive through vaccination site reopened with wait times of 4-5 hours, but in the afternoon that changed to 1 hr then 1/2 hr then nothing. On Sunday wait time was 1 hr in the morning, then after lunch when it changed to 1/2 hr my friend picked me up and drove over there. I got my first shot of Astrazeneca and was home within an hour, including a stop at the liquor store. Now I have to cancel my appointment for vaccination on the 13th.

Atlantic Xpat

This fella on twitter (NS based Epidemiologist) has an excellent thread summarising the C19 situation thus far across Canada & some specific analysis on why Atlantic Canada is doing rather better than elsewhere. (Not just population density & geographic isolation). Worth a read: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1...ZUXx1OnnwR_sIs

BristolUK

It was good to see someone not simply attributing a difference to population/density. Thanks.

Obviously it comes into it but not necessarily the be all and end all.
Before Moncton I was in Longueuil, Quebec. Four times the population density of Moncton. In Longueuil much of the housing was in 6-unit apartment blocks. Housing is more spread out in Moncton but there's a bigger proportion of larger than 6-unit apartment buildings, so communal areas are perhaps used by more people in Moncton.
If I worked in retail, banking, goverment, real estate etc In Moncton I'd be on a bus with the same number of passengers as the Longueuil bus, travelling to and from the same size office with the same number of colleagues and with the same number of customers or clients during the same day which has the same number of hours regardless of which city.

Within New Brunswick, Moncton's population density is more than three times greater than that of Edmundston. Moncton currently has 11 active cases, Edmundston 136. Clearly something else is afoot sometimes.

Siouxie

I don't like the new shutdown of Ontario, but despair of the intelligence of some people - including my ex step daughter who disregarded the regulations and had 14 people over for Easter dinner yesterday. Regulations state you have to restrict it to the people who live in the same household (but can have a person who lives alone join provided it's exclusive, such as her mother) - she has 5 in her household - plus her mother probably joined them, that accounts for 6 - so she invited 8 others. She published the fact on Facebook - bragging about it and posting a live video saying that she hoped everyone enjoyed Easter getting together with all their family and friends! Moronic behaviour at it's finest.

I posted on FB the other day about the shutdown where someone had asked whether it was true or not - I just gave a link - and received several abusive posts in response by a couple of morons who said they were going to ignore the requirements and carry on regardless.. nobody was going to stop them doing what they wanted to.

It's people like these that are causing the damn thing to go on and on and on and on and on..

Danny B

I read on Twitter that there isn't much difference between the old lockdown and the new shutdown, is this true?

Restaurants....

Lockdown: indoor dining prohibited, patio dining allowed

Shutdown: indoor dining and patio dining prohibited


Sports and recreation...

Lockdown: Golf courses open

Shutdown: Golf courses closed

(My sources told me last night golf courses would be open under the new restrictions, so there's that.)


Gatherings:

Lockdown: indoor gatherings banned, outdoor limited to 10 people.

Shutdown: indoor gatherings banned, outdoor limited to 5 people.


Religious, wedding and funeral services:

Lockdown: services are allowed indoors, limited to 15% capacity of the room, outdoors with two metres physical distance

Shutdown: exactly the same


Okay, but does shutdown mean the same as stay at home order?

Doesn't look like it.

Basically the same wording here

Lockdown: "Only go out for essential reasons"

Shutdown: "You should only go out for necessities"


To sum up, the more restrictive measures in Shutdown vs. Lockdown (that I can find) are all about *outdoor* space:
»patio dining closed
»golf courses closed
»outdoor gatherings limit of 5 instead of 10.

Siouxie

That was not the point of my post. Despite the whole Province of Ontario being in Shutdown (as opposed to just a few Cities being in Lockdown) many are ignoring it. Covidiots.

Danny B

Yes I knew what you meant, same thing happened here in BC last year. TBH with you, most Canadians seem to follow rules / orders OK, but they get confused over advisories. I think the provincial governments should have been more draconian and put laws into place instead of these poxy advisories.

printer

Yeah no kidding

bats

It is confusing. There's a whole load of stuff bring posted about small shops and businesses not bring allowed to open when big box stores are, yet the small shops are allowed to open. I looked over the new regulations and it says you should stay in your region but it doesn't define what they mean by region. Additionally it says tgat any workers who might be closer tgan 2m from another person without a barrier between them should wear a mask with eye protection, I haven't seen that happening, I don't think I misread it.

Its rubbish reaaly, Ontario shutdown seems to be tge same as UK easing of restrictions.