Niagara public health considering new COVID-19 restriction on local bars
Proposal adds more responsibility to ensure patrons following rules
Local stakeholders, from restaurant and bar owners to chambers of commerce and tourism groups, are being asked for feedback by Niagara Region about a possible new restrictions on Niagara bars to limit the spread of COVID-19 in the community.
In an email sent Thursday afternoon by Grant Durfey, emergency management program adviser for the Region, and obtained by The Standard, stakeholders are being asked for feedback by Friday on new directives — which would be issued by the Niagara public health department under section 22 of the Ontario Health Protection and Promotion Act — which could include gathering more contact information from customers, limiting seating to groups no larger than six and ensuring customers stay seated while in an establishment except for specific purposes like using a washroom.
“We are asking for any of you to please provide any feedback you may have on the below by Friday, Nov. 6th at 2pm,” wrote Durfey. “Please do not distribute this list further, as it is only a preliminary list and may change. If you have any questions please let me know. Sorry for the short turnaround time, but it is something we are working on quickly.”
The proposed directive would not drastically change the provincewide orders all restaurants and bars are currently operating under. However, they add a new layer of detail to what bars have to do, how long they keep some records, and puts more responsibility on them to ensure patrons are following the rules.
The proposed orders in Durfey’s email include:
> mandatory COVID-19 screening for all customers, which includes a list of 10 questions an employee has to ask.
> in addition to asking for a name and contact number or email, bar employees will have to record when customers arrive and when they leave and what table they were seated at. Currently, an establishment is only required to take a name and phone number.
> Customers will only be able to dine in with members of their own household or with no more than two people who they will have to claim as “socially essentially.” No more than six people will be allowed at a table at a time.
> the above information will have to be kept on record for at least a month — two weeks longer than contact information is currently required to be kept for — and must be handed over to public health officials when required.
> tables must be kept at “a distance of at least two metres, or have Plexiglas or some other impermeable barrier,” between them.
á Hand sanitizer must be at the establishment’s entrance and exit, with prompts for customers to use them when arriving and leaving.
> customers must be seated at all times except when leaving, using the washroom or paying for an order.
> staff must be screened daily and records of those screenings be kept for a month.
Niagara’s acting medical officer of health, Dr. Mustafa Hirji, would not discuss Durfrey’s email Thursday, other than to say issuing directives to bars is something the health department is “always thinking about” to limit the spread of COVID-19.
The proposed order comes as contact tracing by public health investigators have found a significant number of cases contributing to Niagara’s rising COVID-19 case count happen in local bars among people in their 20s.
Acluster of more than 30 people in that age group, now considered by the health department to be a community COVID-19 outbreak, are responsible for bring the potentially lethal novel coronavirus — the virus that causes COVID-19 — into two long- term- care homes. Hirji has declined to say which homes were impacted or if residents of those homes with COVID-19 have died.
“I would say that people gathering in bars or going to house parties, and having close interactions, makes up the majority of those cases,” said Hirji.
More broadly, Niagara residents aged 20 to 39 are generating more new COVID-19 cases than any other demographic, and Hirji points to social gatherings and large social circle through which the virus is spreading, as a significant driver of new novel coronavirus cases in the region.
Section 22 of the Health act gives a medical officer of health the authority to issue orders to prevent the spread of a communicable disease. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, Niagara’s acting medical officer of health has not issued any such orders.
Hirji resisted calls to use that power in the summer to issue a regionwide masking order, saying that such a decision was best left to the elected politicians.
In an interview Thursday, Hirji said prior to the 2003 SARS outbreak, medical officers of health only had the power to issue directives to an individual person or business. However, the SARS outbreak demonstrated that having to issue orders to limit community spread of a disease on a case-by-case was too slow and ineffective, so that power was broadened.
However, Hirji said that he is cautious about issuing directives that impact an entire community or industry because a medical officer of health is an unelected public servant.
“That said, we will issue orders if we feel it’s necessary,” said Hirji, adding that any order must be backed by “overwhelming evidence” that the order in question will have the intended effect.
He said a public health order can be appealed, and so before any directive is issued he wants to ensure it could withstand a legal challenge.
The call for input comes as Niagara’s daily infection rate has been rising. Thursday, with 15 newly confirmed cases, was the first time in a week that the daily case count was less than 20.
However, the number of active cases jumped to 202, a number not seen since late April during the first COVID-19 wave.
The number of outbreaks has also risen, with public health reporting 18 of them in Niagara Thursday. Six of those outbreaks are in long-term-care homes.
At least 74 Niagara residents with COVID-19 have died during the pandemic. Ten have died since Oct. 5.