Residents in three Quebec regions won’t be allowed to visit friends or family at home for most of October or eat out at their favourite restaurant as the provincial government struggles to slow the surge of new coronavirus cases.
Montreal, Quebec City and Chaudière-Appalaches regions are now considered red zones under the province’s COVID-19 alert system, Quebec Premier François Legault said Monday.
“I’m a bit heavy-hearted today,” Legault said during a late afternoon news conference.
“We looked at the results over the weekend, and the number of cases has gone up significantly.”
This rise in cases could lead to an increase of hospitalizations and deaths, he said, and the government must act quickly in the interest of all Quebecers.
“We need to make some difficult decisions,” Legault said.
The new restrictions, announced after Quebec reported 750 new coronavirus cases, take effect 12:01 a.m. ET on Thursday and are set to last for 28 days, until Oct. 28, in the red zones. The restrictions are:
A ban on home gatherings, with some exceptions, such as a single caregiver allowed per visit.
All bars, casinos and restaurants are closed (takeout only).
Libraries, museums, cinemas and theatres will also be closed.
Being less than two metres apart will be prohibited. Masks will be mandatory during demonstrations.
Houses of worship and venues for events, such as funerals and weddings, will have a 25-person limit.
Hair salons, hotels and other such businesses will stay open.
Schools will remain open.
“Schools must remain open,” Legault said. “Businesses are open so parents can continue to work and earn money.”
Though people are generally following the public health guidelines, Legault said many are not and he showed frustration toward those who are throwing caution to the wind.
“That doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “We are not putting measures in place just for fun. We are putting measures in place to protect others.“
WATCH | Legault announces new measures:
Further restrictions in these regions start October 1. 2:55
Legault said the government is working on compensation packages for those businesses that are being shut down by the pandemic, though he declined to go into detail about those packages.
The government is enacting the restrictions as of Thursday to give the owners of businesses that will be closed time to prepare, he said.
The government could restrict travel between regions as was done in the spring under public health guidelines, but for now it won’t be banned.
However, travel between different regions of the province is strongly discouraged, Legault said.
Legault making right decision, specialist says
The government has been urging people to stop socializing for a month in order to slow the spread of the virus. Now that it is prohibited to gather in homes, Legault said the Public Security Ministry is now exploring how the regulation will be enforced.
Dr. Cécile Tremblay, an infectious disease specialist at the Université de Montréal hospital, said the government is making the right decision.
“People can get a serious illness even if they are young,” she said. “People can die even if they are young.”
WATCH | Infectious disease specialist explains why Quebec is so hard hit:
Infectious disease specialist Dr. Cécile Tremblay discusses how we got there and what it means. 1:52
She said the extent of long-term damage COVID-19 is causing to the heart, lungs and other organs is still not known and that it is important that everybody, including young people, does their part to prevent the spread of the disease.
Shutting down for 28 days is a good start, but it’s hard to say how effective it will be, Tremblay said. Strict health measures have prevented transmission in other countries, she said, but it all depends on how well the population respects the rules.
The hope is to limit the impact on the health-care network, especially with the cold and flu season upon us, she said.
Cases on the rise in Quebec
Quebec reported 750 new cases on Monday, 245 of which were on the island of Montreal. The Quebec City area, which had few cases during the first wave in the spring, had another 125 cases.
Quebec City and its immediate environs have emerged as a second epicentre of the fall coronavirus wave.
Taken together, the Capitale-Nationale region and Chaudière-Appalaches added more than 1,000 cases from Sept. 20-27.
Infection rates also continued to tick upward in the Eastern Townships, the Mauricie, the Gaspé Peninsula and Lanaudière.
Many regions have set new single-day records for COVID-19 cases; in the cases of Quebec City and Chaudière-Appalaches, they have tended to be superseded a short time later.
As Quebec City Mayor Régis Labeaume said succinctly last week: “The virus is among us.”
Hospitalizations are still manageable, but that could still change, according to Dr. Matthew Oughton, an infectious disease specialist at the Jewish General Hospital.
He said the gradual increase in cases throughout September is similar to what happened in the spring. Because it takes several days for people to develop symptoms severe enough to seek medical care, he explained, it leads to an avalanche of new patients down the road.
WATCH | COVID-19 surge forces new lockdown in Quebec:
With surging COVID-19 cases, three areas of Quebec, including Montreal and Quebec City, will become “red zones” on Thursday for 28 days, meaning bars and theatres will close and restaurants will revert to take-out only. 2:03
“It is quite clear we are going to see this wave of hospitalizations increase and likely accelerate,” he said. “It’s a little discouraging to see we are going through the same process again.”
Quebec’s Health Ministry reported Monday there were already more than 5,000 health-care workers in the Montreal hospital network on leave.
“The rise in new cases is not simply because of an increase in the number of tests,” said Dr. Donald Vinh, a microbiologist at the McGill University Health Centre.
“It’s that the tests are becoming positive more often. That’s what worries us.”
So far, there has been a total of 1,163 cases in 489 schools in Quebec. There are more than 3,000 public and private schools across the province, with more than than one million students and 226,000 staff.
Neighbouring Ontario has also seen a resurgence of the virus. The province reported more than 700 cases today, the most on a single day since the start of the pandemic.
There have been 1,163 COVID-19 cases in 489 schools in Quebec so far this year, but public health says schools are not a driver of transmission. (Ivanoh Demers/Radio-Canada)
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
