COVID-19 situation is under control, Legault says
Premier defends move to reopen schools and businesses gradually
Premier François Legault is defending his government’s decision to proceed with school and business reopenings, saying the COVID-19 situation is “under control” in Quebec.
Facing criticism — including from the province’s own public health institute — Legault insisted the virus has peaked in Quebec, enough to justify the government’s decision to “gradually open schools and companies.”
“We think that, in the general population, it’s quite under control,” Legault said at his Tuesday pandemic briefing. “But we want to make sure that the number of deaths and the situation in the general population stays under control.”
Legault arrived armed with a chart indicating a breakdown of the deaths in Quebec over the last weeks of the pandemic. He said if you exclude the deaths that happened in public and private seniors’ residences, the situation in the general population has been stable for the last two weeks with between eight to 10 people dying daily.
He also repeated that 97 per cent of Quebec’s deaths have been people over 60 years old, which means the children being sent back to school in the coming weeks are not at risk.
Legault was asked about Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s comment Wednesday when he said Ontario will not be following Quebec’s lead on school reopenings.
“I’m not going to put our children in a crowded classroom, I’m just not going to do it,” Ford said.
Legault responded that it’s all a question of balance, noting six months out of school for a student with learning difficulties is a bigger risk than a return to school.
“It is a matter of risk evaluation,” Legault said. “Nothing is perfect, nothing in life is 100 per cent, but we calculate, with the help of public health, that it’s better for children to return to school.”
Legault was also asked about a position paper published by Quebec’s public health institute, l’institut nationale de la santé publique, which states if the strict distancing prescribed by the government is not respected, back-toschool could be accompanied by a resurgence of the coronavirus.
Legault announced Monday that elementary schools in Quebec would reopen May 11 in regions outside the greater Montreal area. The reopening date in the Montreal region, including Laval and the South Shore, is May 19.
The institute also questions the herd immunity strategy first advanced by Legault last week to justify the openings. The institute said such a strategy, which implies allowing young people to be infected with the virus as a way of boosting provincial immunity, will lead to a sharp increase in the number of adults being infected and more pressure on hospital and intensive-care units.
In listing his five reasons to justify opening schools on Monday, Legault quietly dropped the herd idea, a move noticed by his critics.
“They (the institute) say it’s possible, but we have no proof that this works,” Legault responded Tuesday to justify the change of heart.
Over the weekend, the federal chief medical officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, also questioned the herd immunity concept saying it’s “not a concept which should be supported.”
But Quebec’s director of public health, Horacio Arruda, said there is no contradiction between Quebec and Ottawa, just a different interpretation. He noted recent studies indicate children, who already have a low risk of getting the virus, are not in fact great transmitters of COVID-19. They transmit the regular flu better.
Keeping children out of schools will mean the most vulnerable among them will be deprived of education and even free food at schools, Arruda noted. He agreed, however, that opening up Quebec will inevitably lead to the virus circulating more and “there will be some people who will die” because they will refuse to respect the social distancing rules.
“But the gradual reopening will minimize this element,” Arruda said. “Nobody will tell you there will be no transmission. Yes, there will be cases. This is what we call weighted risks.”
Arruda argued that by massively increasing targeted testing — from the current 5,000 a day to 20,000 or 30,000 a day, as Quebec is planning — health officials will know rapidly where the province is headed. He will issue orders in the event things slip out of control.
Legault and Economic Development Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon teamed up at Tuesday’s briefing to announce a gradual reopening of Quebec, which will stretch through the summer.
Starting May 4, retail stores with exterior entrances in the regions beyond the greater Montreal area will reopen. The Montreal reopening for those type of stores will be May 11. Shopping malls will remain closed until further notice to avoid illegal gatherings.
As of May 11, all road and infrastructure projects will restart. The same date goes for restarting the manufacturing sector but with limits on the number of workers allowed on the floor.
Fitzgibbon estimated 1.2 million Quebecers have lost their jobs as a result of the pandemic, but the reopenings will give work back to 500,000 people.
Dining rooms in restaurants, hair salons, theatres and museums, cultural and tourist sites, campgrounds and all outdoor summer shows will have to wait for now when it comes to reopening.
Nobody will tell you there will be no transmission. Yes, there will be cases. This is what we call weighted risks.