Families can remove parents from seniors’ homes: Legault
Families will be allowed to move their parents and grandparents out of long-term care and seniors’ residences if they feel such places are no longer safe, the Legault government announced Friday.
With hundreds of residences struck by the COVID-19 virus and older citizens considered extremely vulnerable, Premier François Legault and Health Minister Danielle Mccann said they understand some Quebec families want to rescue their parents and grandparents and care for them at their own homes.
“We’re all very sensitive to this situation,” Mccann said at Legault’s daily briefing Friday. “If the family wants to do that, and take care of their own family member, they’ll be able to do it with the proper protection.
“We discussed this very quickly yesterday and we decided this is the way to go. People will be able, by arrangement, to go and get the family member.”
The decision is a shift. A day earlier, Quebec director of public health Horacio Arruda said he was uneasy about such moves, because it could mean the virus being spread to new regions. He also expressed concern that the homes seniors are being taken to could be harbouring the virus.
By Friday, the new policy was in place. Mccann said the family must come to the door of the residence and pick up their family member and his or her belongings directly. They are not allowed to go into the residence.
The person must be well enough to be able to leave on their own, and must have no contact with any other residents on the way out. The centre must not have any cases of COVID -19.
An aide to Mccann later explained if a resident leaves a public long-term care facility (CHSLD), it is understood they will stay out for the remainder of the pandemic. Their room would be made available for others on the waiting list.
A person leaving a private non-subsidized residence would not have to worry about losing their room as long as the rent is paid.
A family wanting to move their parent from one region to another would need a letter from the establishment in order to cross through police checkpoints.
There was pressure on Quebec to make this possible, given the eroding conditions in residences. Arruda revealed this week that 519 out of 2,220 residences have been hit by the virus.
Also at Friday’s briefing, Legault announced plans to make public Tuesday a projection on the number of Quebec deaths from COVID-19, as Ontario did Friday.
Ontario public-health authorities’ projections show that up to 1,600 people could die of COVID -19 by the end of April.
“We will give you those numbers,” Legault said. “We will be very transparent.”
He said Quebec has taken stricter measures to slow the spread of the coronavirus than Ontario has, such as closing non-essential businesses and construction sites.
In Quebec, 61 people are confirmed to have died of COVID-19 as of Friday — an increase of 25 from Thursday. However, not all of those deaths are new, Legault said; some have only now been confirmed as being related to COVID-19.
One of the deaths was a Montrealer between the ages of 30 and 39 — a first in that age group. The other new deaths were people at least 70 years of age, Legault said.
There are 6,101 confirmed cases of COVID -19 in Quebec. The number of people hospitalized stands at 429, with 122 in intensive care.
In Montreal, there are now 2,837 cases of COVID-19. There are 583 cases in the Montérégie, and 476 in Laval.
As is the case with the federal government, Quebec continues to add programs to help citizens and businesses through the crisis. Friday morning, Economy Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced a $150-million aid program for small and medium-sized businesses.
Later in the day, Finance Minister Eric Girard and Employment Minister Jean Boulet announced more money for low-income earners in essential-service jobs who might have been tempted to stay home and get by on the new emergency $2,000 federal pandemic payment.
Quebec is increasingly dependent on these workers, including cashiers, cleaning staff, pharmacy and dépanneur workers, and delivery persons. The workers will get $100 more a month under the program, which will benefit 600,000 people and cost $890 million.
Legault also said Friday that the province has enough medical equipment for the next eight days.