Moe’s COVID-19 message needs more clarity

In fairness to Premier Scott Moe and his government, he made it clear from the get-go that the rules and regulations would have to change and evolve.

When he first unveiled the Re-open Saskatchewan plan April 23, about five weeks into the shutdown, Moe made it crystal clear his Saskatchewan Party government would “carefully monitor” the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths and would “adjust the plan if required.”

There is no manual as to what works best. Moe and other premiers are writing that manual as they go.

But in fairness to the rest of us, it would be much easier if the premier and his health officials would be clearer on rules and expectations for public conduct.

Obviously, this is a big and difficult thing to ask of a government, but this is what leadership is all about. And, right now, that should mean political and health leaders offering something definitive as to what expectations should be — something that may not be happening as well as it should in the government’s daily briefings.

Consider Thursday’s briefing in which the government announced two new cases and nine recoveries, reducing the active cases in Saskatchewan to 61. It was indicative of what seemed a very good week in the COVID-19 fight that is seeing the lowest weekly new case total in a month, despite added testing.

Even in the north, where the outbreak in La Loche caused numbers to skyrocket, the 55 active cases (as of Thursday) is the lowest total in a month and 100 less than the May 10 peak of 156 active cases. It was enough for the premier to start contemplating lifting some travel restrictions in the northern half of the province that have sent mixed signals to the public as to our success fighting COVID -19 and whether or not we should have been proceeding with reopening Saskatchewan as rapidly as we have.

Notwithstanding this week’s overall messaging of success in this fight, there are puzzling inconsistencies in what the government is telling us about how we should be moving forward and how we should act.

For example, one seemingly big problem for the government, the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) and chief medical officer Dr. Saqib Shahab is an “outbreak” in Saskatoon emerging from what they describe as a large gathering clearly in violation of the 10-person rule.

The problem, however, is that Shahab and the government were not exactly clear on the nature of the gathering (some sort of family event) or even how many people were actually at this event.

While the government talked about 60 people potentially being affected, it was not immediately clear whether that meant 60 people at the actual event (a clear violation of the 10-person-gathering rule, which would seem meritorious of a fine) or the total number being looked at in contact tracing. Instead, Shabab went on to suggest the public shouldn’t worry or need details on where and when this event occurred because all those involved had been contacted.

Moreover, they chose to use the word “outbreak” — the same language is used in the La Loche situation — when we may only be talking about one COVID -19 case.

It’s become part of a bit of a confusing overall message where Shahab and the government suggest we “try” to avoid “large gatherings” where “food is shared.”

Suggesting people use their own best judgment can be rather dangerous at the best of times. But it becomes especially dangerous when the government is sending out ambiguous, mixed signals of making gains on COVID-19 and being well-positioned for the implementation of Stage 3 on June 8 and rightly advising us to continue caution about the size and nature of gatherings.

Admittedly, it is a tough task for Moe, Shahab and company. We are making progress and we will get through all of this.

But we will get through this a lot faster and a lot more effectively if we can all get on the same page of this writeas-we-go manual.

Mandryk is political columnist for the Regina Leader-post and Saskatoon Starphoenix.