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Canadian Politics: The Surreality of Life under King Corona


Tywin Manderly

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Reading your last update @Fragile Bird, I'd probably have preferred to see the provinces (esp. the large ones) wait a little longer before raising people's hopes and relaxing some restrictions. Ford's tone has become noticeably optimistic in recent days.

This does feel like the peak of the (likely first) wave (Canada went past 200 deaths / day for the first time this week)...but I do worry that QC and ON are getting a little twitchy on the trigger. Let's actually see the predicted decrease (not just stabilization) in the data before we act. 

I wonder whether the large recovery numbers Canada is now reporting might be making the provinces feel more comfortable, because it means that the number of active cases is now almost flat-lining. 

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My lord, just when you think things are getting better Quebec does it again. 2,209 cases added in Quebec, 892 new cases and 1,317 missing confirmed cases due to a ‘computer error’. And 69 new deaths.

Nobody does incompetence like Quebec.

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5 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

My lord, just when you think things are getting better Quebec does it again. 2,209 cases added in Quebec, 892 new cases and 1,317 missing confirmed cases due to a ‘computer error’. And 69 new deaths.

Nobody does incompetence like Quebec.

Even without the error, they’ve recorded over 1,000 new cases / day in recent days. It’s an interesting time to be relaxing restrictions...let’s hope for the best. I definitely would’ve liked to see the number of active cases in Quebec falling before they proceed with any substantial re-opening.

We are starting to see some local businesses close permanently in downtown TO. Sad. It looks as if Morneau dropped the ball on commercial rental assistance.

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On 5/3/2020 at 8:02 PM, Paxter said:

We are starting to see some local businesses close permanently in downtown TO. Sad. It looks as if Morneau dropped the ball on commercial rental assistance.

Same in my local - starting to see a few places getting emptied out.

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10 hours ago, Lord of Oop North said:

Same in my local - starting to see a few places getting emptied out.

It's sad hey. It would be interesting to know how many are closing down by choice (due to zero revenues) versus being evicted for not paying rent. 

I don't know that commercial landlords really have much to gain from eviction at this point. Who wants to start or expand a business in this environment? Perhaps it is skewed to situations where the landlord-tenant relationship was already strained. 

Restaurants are going to be pretty hard hit even when restrictions are lifted. I am a pretty avid restaurant-goer usually, but with the financial situation, potential health risks and being accustomed now to cook at home...I don't think my habits of eating out are going to return quickly. I am kinda keen to go out dancing though haha. But it will be a while before clubs re-open.

ETA: Nice to see you LooN. 

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On 5/2/2020 at 6:26 AM, Tywin Manderly said:

Please continue. :)

You closed the last thread with the comment that a Covid-19 outbreak in Nunavut would be terrible, since there isn't a large hospital infrastructure.

Just so that you know, the case was a false positive. There are still no cases in Nunavut.

The Yukon, NWT and Nunavut have closed their borders. If you are a returning resident, say someone who had a job out of province that has disappeared because of the virus and you want to come home, you must file a 14-day quarantine plan with the appropriate Health Ministry and you cannot come back until your plan has been approved.

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This was the last Update from the previous thread, for reference purposes, which I will bring up to date.

Apr.             28                    29                     30                  1                         

             cases deaths   cases deaths   cases deaths  cases deaths  

BC           55        2          34       4          25       2          33       1      

Albt       154        5         315      7        190       3        218       3

Sask           1        0          17      1            6        0          26       0           

Man           0        0           1        0           2        0           4        0      

ON          525      59       347      45       459      86        421     39   

Que         775      83       837      79       944      98     1,110    163

NB             0        0          0         0            0         0          0        0

NS            15       3         20         1          12        0         12        1            

PEI             1        0           0         0            0        0          0         0   

Nfld           0        0           0         0            0        0          1         0

Nunavut     0       0           0         0            1        0          0         0

Totals     1526   152     1571     137      1639    189     1825     207

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M                  2                   3                   4                    5                   6   

             cases deaths cases deaths cases deaths cases deaths  cases deaths 

BC            26      2           -       -          53       3          8        4    

Albt         97       2         96      1         70        9        57        2

Sask          6       0         12       0         34       0         20       0       25     

Man         1        0           1       0           0       0           1       1         2

ON        511     55        434    40        370     84       387     61     412    68

Que     1008   114      2209    69        758     75       794   118    910   112 

NB            0        0            0      0           0        0          1       0         1     0

NS            4        2            8      6          14       1          6       3         7      0 

PEI           0         0            0      0            0       0          0       0

Nfld         1         0            0      0            0       0          0       0

Totals  1653    175      2760    116    1299    172    1274   189

I think I am getting more cheerful now. Our doubling period is 20 days, up from 16 when the Federal government gave their model update. NB had no new cases for 12 days and all current cases had recovered, and then they found 1 case. I think all the cases in the north have recovered as well. All the recent bump-ups in various provinces seem to have been around meat packing plants. We are definitely seeing improving trends.

I think the CTV site is the best one to see the trends. Look at every province, but don't look at the 7-day average, look at the daily new cases. 

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/tracking-every-case-of-covid-19-in-canada-1.4852102

eta: watching the Saskatchewan press conference. The outbreak in Saskatchewan is in the far north, La Loche. 24 out of 25 cases reported today are there, as well as the most of the rest of the new cases this past week, a hotspot in other words.

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Some more "glass-half-full" comments to echo @Fragile Bird above:

  • Alberta has gone four days in a row of reporting less than 100 new cases per day.
  • Ontario was at 500-600 cases per day two weeks ago, 400-500 last week and 400 this week. Let's go for under 300 next week!
  • BC hasn't had more than 40 cases per day this month. 

But:

  • No real sign of a slowdown in QC - just plateauing. 
  • Saskatchewan is having its worst stretch of the pandemic so far, with three days in a row of over 20 new cases. 
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Update

May               6                   7                   8                   9                    10

             cases deaths cases deaths cases deaths cases deaths  cases deaths 

BC            23       3        33      2          29      1         15       2           -       -

Albt         70       6        54       2          81      1         59       1        96       1

Sask         25      0         19       0         13       0          9       0         11       0 

Man          2       0           0       0           1       0          0       0           3       0

ON        412     68       400     48       477      33      346     59       294     35

Que       910   112       911   121       912      94      836     61       735   142  

NB            1        0           0       0          0         0         0       0           0       0

NS            7        0           9       3          1         2         3        1          7       0

PEI            0        0           0      0           0        0          0        0          0       0

Nfld          0        0           2      0           0        0          0        0          0       0    

Totals   1442   189     1428   176    1513     131    1268    124    1146   178

Ontario had the lowest number of new cases since March, with twice the number being tested. Three provinces continue their run of 0 cases. Quebec had a large number of deaths because deaths lag by at least two weeks, but new cases dropped. 

I will bet that next week we'll see cross Canada numbers go below 1,000.

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Ontario starting to kick some ass. Active cases are now at 3,746, down from the mid-5000s at the end of April. With luck, we will be at or below 1,000 cases by June.

Quebec. Nearly 26,000 cases and rising. One province is accounting for over 80% of Canada's active cases. 

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There are some Ontario numbers that really took me by surprise. Only 78 deaths out of 1,669 confirmed deaths were people younger than 60. 1,174 were over 80. 1,398 deaths were in LTC or retirement homes. That’s 83%.
308 new cases today.

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Update

May           7          8           9          10          11

             cases     cases     cases    cases     cases    cases

BC            33         29          15          -           23

Albt          54         81          59         96         49

Sask          19         13           9          11          4 

Man            0           1           0            3          2

ON          400       477        346        294      308

Que         911       912        836        735      748 

NB               0          0            0            0           0     

NS               9          1             3            7          1

PEI               0          0             0            0          0       

Nfld             2          0             0            0          0           

Totals     1428     1513       1268      1146    1133

Things look pretty good. As I said yesterday, I think the daily numbers will drop below 1000 soon. Let's hope Quebec finally has a handle on stuff. Well, as long as more meat packing plants don't have outbreaks again. That Cargill plant's outbreak in Alberta was the worst in North America. I have eliminated the death totals for now. Quebec will continue to have high numbers until they get over that big hump in cases.

On the bright side, half of all cases are resolved. Most of the active cases are in Quebec, of course, a staggering 25,753 out of Canada's 31,994. Ontario, in comparison has 3,746 active cases out of a total of 20,546 confirmed cases. Of course we all know that there are more cases out there, but the idea that Quebec has almost as many deceased, 3,013, as Ontario has active cases, is pretty scary.

It really makes me think that Quebec has a more virulent version of the virus in it's territory, and I suspect it came from New York, since there is a huge amount of north-south travel across the border.

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16 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

It really makes me think that Quebec has a more virulent version of the virus in it's territory, and I suspect it came from New York, since there is a huge amount of north-south travel across the border.

I've wondered this too. At the end of the day I just can't get my head around the differing public health outcomes across geographic locations.

QC and ON just seem too similar in too many ways for the QC experience to have been this idiosyncratic. 

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Another good week for Canada. We should go below 1,000 new cases / day next week for the first time since March!

Lockdown easing is starting to ramp up though...which of course carries risks.

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Update

May          10         11        12        13         14

             cases     cases    cases    cases     cases                

BC             -           23           7        16        15

Albt          96         49          46       62        50

Sask          11          4            5         4          5

Man            3          2            1         0          0

ON          294      308        361     329      345

Que         735      748        756     706      793   

NB               0          0            0         0          0

NS               7          1            1         4          2

PEI               0          0            0         0          0         

Nfld             0          0            0         0          0           

Totals     1146    1133      1176    1121   1210           

I haven't listened to the press conferences today, but heard details about Ontario starting to reopen. I'm rather nervous about that being done without easily accessible testing centers for everyone.

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I have three close med school friends ( two in Sask & one in Toronto) who are now all doctors working in Canada so I've *sorta* been keeping up with the pandemic over there - like y'all, I was curious about Quebec and came across this Guardian article which was interesting ( defo don't know enough about the Canadian health system or Quebec to know how on or off the mark the article is)

 

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3 hours ago, Raja said:

I have three close med school friends ( two in Sask & one in Toronto) who are now all doctors working in Canada so I've *sorta* been keeping up with the pandemic over there - like y'all, I was curious about Quebec and came across this Guardian article which was interesting ( defo don't know enough about the Canadian health system or Quebec to know how on or off the mark the article is)

 

The really sad fact is that Canada has utterly failed the elderly. A little over 80% of the deaths in Canada have been in LTC homes, and it doesn't matter if it's Quebec or Nova Scotia or wherever. Nova Scotia has had 51 deaths, 44 or more have been in a single nursing home. 1308 of Ontario's 1,798 deaths have happened in nursing homes. Imagine, only 409 deaths in the province otherwise, in a population of 14.6 M. There have been 5,468 deaths in Canada, 3,351 in Quebec. 80% is 2,680. 

It's mainly illegal to collect statistics on the basis of ethnicity, or colour, but I certainly expect researchers will dive into breaking down the numbers once this is over. I have read that jobs in the health care industry have been a magnet for refugees in Quebec, with 1,500 working in the industry in Quebec. I took a look at the Quebec website, and they don'y say how many healthcare workers have died in the province, but in Ontario only 5 have died. The first nurse to die in all of Canada died yesterday, in Ontario. She was white.

I don't doubt a lot of healthcare workers have gotten sick, but I don't know that the majority of the deaths have been among refugees and the poor. We just don't have that information. But, only 2% of deaths (66) have been younger than 60, and I think the vast majority of refugees are younger people, not seniors. 6.5% are between 60 and 69, so about 217 people. (In Quebec)

Of course, we also know that it's people regularly exposed to other people who get sick and die, in other words, service workers, and they are the working class. They don't get to stay at home. 6 airport limousine drivers in Toronto have died of Covid-19, with 4 more suspected to have died of the virus. A lot of those drivers are Asian, mainly Indian and Pakistani.

Here are today's Canadian numbers, fyi.

https://www.canada.ca/content/dam/phac-aspc/documents/services/diseases/2019-novel-coronavirus-infection/surv-covid19-epi-update-eng.pdf

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On 5/6/2020 at 9:59 AM, Fragile Bird said:

The Yukon, NWT and Nunavut have closed their borders. If you are a returning resident, say someone who had a job out of province that has disappeared because of the virus and you want to come home, you must file a 14-day quarantine plan with the appropriate Health Ministry and you cannot come back until your plan has been approved.

As of mid-March, I was planning a work trip up North of Yellowknife for mid-April. At that time, the site was still allowing visitors if their work was deemed essential enough and they are still having rotating flights of employees. I was relieved to have the trip cancelled even before full quarantine orders were enacted.

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