Hinshaw getting top marks in Alberta

EDMONTON • A clear and consistent communications strategy is key to managing any crisis, and across the country, provinces and the federal government have been approaching the COVID-19 outbreak with varying levels of success.

This week, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who has been giving daily briefings to Canadians, has faced considerable pressure to release projections on the expected scope of the outbreak; Ontario’s Doug Ford, on Thursday, announced his government would hold a briefing on COVID-19 modelling on Friday for journalists. Premier Scott Moe in Saskatchewan followed suit. Earlier in the week, the Alberta government confirmed that it, too, would be releasing projections.

“I don’t know if there’s any one blueprint for success in this case,” said Macewan University journalism and communications professor Neill Fitzpatrick.

But, he said, “any provincial governments — Alberta or otherwise — that even gives the appearance of holding back information is doing it at its own peril.”

There is, in Alberta, a widespread perception that Dr. Deena Hinshaw, the province’s chief medical officer of health, is doing an excellent job. She’s received plaudits for her calm and comprehensible assessments of the pandemic in the province, speaking to Albertans most days, often joined by Premier Jason Kenney and an assortment of other ministers.

“She just has put this kind of face on it,” said Thomas Barker, a communications professor at the University of Alberta.

He said Hinshaw — and the Alberta government — is doing an excellent job of conveying the necessary expert opinion on the pandemic, with the assessments of risk, but also the social or human side of things.

“In this pandemic, the experts are winning. The experts are maintaining their dominance as the place to go to get sound advice on which to base key decisions, such as whether to implement, let’s say, social distancing on a personal level,” said Barker.

Shauna MacDonald, the founder of Brookline Public Relations in Calgary, said the Alberta government has put in place extensive crisis communications strategies. Having a number of people involved in the briefings provides a sense that there is a lot of expertise at work.

“We have a really good tag-team approach in the province,” MacDonald said. “It’s open, it’s honest, very measured.”

In terms of projections, British Columbia released its COVID-19 estimates last week. Ontario releases extensive daily epidemiological data about cases, ages, hospitalizations and other information. Alberta’s approach is slightly different, although the province has said its projection data is coming.

There are 968 cases of COVID-19 in Alberta, 67 hospital admissions from the infection and 13 deaths.