REOPENING CHECKLIST
Health unit gets specific
Sector-specific health and safety guidelines for businesses reopening during the COVID -19 pandemic are now available through the local health unit’s website.
As an expansion to the Safe Return to Business toolkit launched in May by the Windsor-essex County Health Unit and Windsor-essex Regional Chamber of Commerce, the additional checklists are tailored to a dozen different categories of business, including construction sites, office settings, outdoor recreation, and gyms.
“Our team has continued to meet virtually and review many reopening plans providing tailored support and advice to many businesses,” medical officer of health Dr. Wajid Ahmed said during the health unit’s daily news conference.
The health unit continues to receive requests for recommendations from businesses looking to reopen safely, he said. In response, public health staff have created additional guidance tools for a variety of business sectors to access with a few mouse clicks.
“If one gym is approaching us and asking for some guidance, we not only provide them with individual guidance, but we also then create a checklist that can be used by others,” Ahmed said. “We continue to populate more and more documents as we receive more requests and identify the need.”
“We are here to support everyone. Any of the businesses, any specific industry, if they have any questions or need more guidance from us, I would encourage them to connect with us and we’ll try our best to work with them.”
Most of the checklists advise businesses to post signage about things visitors need to do when they arrive, like screen for COVID-19 symptoms, wear a mask, and use hand sanitizer. Other points vary from sector to sector. For example, car dealerships are encouraged to modify test drive policies to exclude a staff member ride along, and to implement enhanced vehicle disinfection practices. The checklist for construction companies includes limiting the number of people who use elevators, scaffolds, and hoists at one time to ensure room for physical distancing, and to ensure shared equipment and power tools are sanitized between users.
Checklists are also available for personal service settings, libraries, emergency food distribution, faithbased organizations, organizations working with vulnerable populations, and food premises and bars.
Toaccesstailoredreturn-to-business checklists, which are available in English and French, visit wechu. org/cv/workplace-specific.
The medical officer of health also credited Windsor-essex residents for following public health measures. Health unit CEO Theresa Marentette on Wednesday reported only one additional case of COVID-19 in the region — an agricultural farm worker.
To date, 2,350 local residents have tested positive for the novel coronavirus. Of those, 298 active cases are self-isolating, while 10 active cases are in hospital. Three of those individuals are in intensive care.
The number of people listed as recovered from COVID -19 surged up by more than 500 overnight to a total of 1,955 on Wednesday. Ahmed attributed the jump in part to delays in hearing back from individuals who tested positive more than 14 days prior — the amount of time it typically takes for people to recover — to see if they are truly symptom-free. Other complications caused by the number of different data reporting systems in place also meant the number of individuals who had recovered from the virus was not accurately reflected recently on the health unit’s website.
No additional deaths were reported. A total of 71 people in Windsor-essex have lost their lives due to complications from the disease. Two of the deaths were among migrant farm workers, and 49 were residents of long-term care and retirement homes.
The health status of 17 people with COVID-19 is still under investigation by public health staff.
The health unit continues to monitor an outbreak of the disease at Augustine Villas, a retirement home in Kingsville where three staff members have tested positive since July 10. The outbreak reported at Chartwell Leamington retirement home has since been resolved.
Fourteen other workplaces have active COVID-19 outbreaks. Six are agricultural businesses in Kingsville and Leamington, seven are manufacturing facilities in Kingsville, Tecumseh, Leamington, and Windsor, and one is a construction facility in Leamington.
Windsor-essex is the only region in Ontario that remains in Stage 2 of the provincial government’s reopening strategy.
In a news release on Wednesday, Ontario NDP Leader Andrew Horwath urged Premier Doug Ford to “immediately take the actions necessary to move the Windsor-essex Region into Stage 3,” including increased funding and resources for local public health to conduct COVID -19 testing and to hire more staff for case management and contact tracing.
“The prolonged health and economic crisis in the Windsor-essex region is a direct result of Doug Ford failing to test in this region, and having migrant workers work while sick,” said Horwath.