Legault isolates after O'toole tests positive

Premier François Legault will undergo a COVID -19 test and self isolate in the wake of a positive test for Conservative Leader Erin O'toole whom he met earlier this week.

In a tweet posted late Friday evening, Legault, who was in Ottawa Friday meeting with three other premiers, said as a precaution he will get tested.

He and O'toole held talks Monday in Montreal.

“Mr. O'toole having tested positive for COVID-19, I will, as a precaution, pass a test and isolate myself at home,” Legault said in the tweet.

“Nobody is safe from the contagion. Be careful.”

Legault is the second provincial politician to subject himself to a test and to self-isolate. Liberal Leader Dominique Anglade did the same thing this week, missing the first day of the new sitting of the National Assembly.

She returned Thursday after testing negative.

O'toole announced Friday that he had tested positive and would self-isolate. He was tested in Gatineau Thursday after one of his staffers tested positive.

A statement from the Conservative Party says O'toole, 47, is “feeling well.” His wife, Rebecca, and their children Mollie and Jack, all tested negative.

Bloc Québécois leader Yvesfrançois Blanchet has also tested positive. Blanchet's wife, Nancy Deziel, tested positive for the illness earlier this week, after losing her sense of smell, and Blanchet said then that he would be tested as a precaution.

“He will stay in isolation at his home in Shawinigan until Sept. 26, in conformance with the instructions of Quebec public health,” the Bloc said in a statement. “He feels perfectly well.”

Both men will now be unable to attend next week's throne speech, with Blanchet required to isolate until at least Sept. 26 and O'toole until at least Oct. 1.