Last Updated on: 25th May 2020, 07:55 am
Doug ford has, as I’ve said before, done a largely solid job of handling the Coronavirus outbreak. But he’s starting to show signs that, at the end of the day, he’s still Doug Ford.
Not calling a full inquiry into what’s happening in long-term care facilities and instead opting for a less thorough, government lead commission, for a start. There’s only one reason why you do that. You want to maintain control over every aspect of it so that you can ensure to the best of your abilities that whatever it finds lines up with what you would like it to line up with.
The government says its reasoning is that inquiries take too long and we need answers now. Arguable, so allow me to argue against it. If we really want to get to the bottom of whatever issues there are in the system, what we need are good answers, not quick ones. And what we absolutely don’t need are answers manipulated into being by the sitting government of the day, no matter how much I happen to like or dislike whomever that government happens to be.
And then there’s this testing business. Opening it up to as many people as possible is certainly something we should be doing, but nobody needs an appointment? What?
“If you are worried you have COVID-19, or that you’ve been exposed to someone who has COVID-19, even if you’re not showing symptoms, please go get a test,” Ford said during a televised speech on Sunday.
“You will not be turned away, you don’t need an appointment, just show up.”
If that was anything other than an extremely unfortunate slip of the tongue by a guy who’s frustrated and tired, it’s nonsense. Just go ahead and show up at the testing centre has awful idea written all over it. It’s a fine way to overwhelm a system that’s already clearly struggling to keep up with the seemingly ever changing numbers expected of it, not to mention the chaos that could easily ensue as you try to enforce distancing rules in a long ass line full of people who might be ill.
Sure enough, assessment sites are already telling people to call ahead to schedule, because of course they are.
“The centres have been open. We’ve extended the hours,” St. Mary’s General Hospital’s president Lee Fairclough. “They can come and be tested. Basically, it’s a phone call to book a time.”
The centres expanded testing to anyone with symptoms on the holiday weekend, following earlier provincial directives.Local testing centres are all open seven days a week, although hours vary. Information is posted on Region of Waterloo Public Health’s site, including locations, hours and numbers to call for an appointment.
The St. Mary’s location, which is in north Waterloo where it held a cardiac program, tested 44 people on Saturday and most weekdays reaches close to the current capacity of 55.
“We have the ability to expand that as we need to,” Fairclough said.
People shouldn’t hesitate to get tested, as all the locations have the capacity to test more people and Fairclough emphasized that there’s no need to worry about overburdening the health system.People also don’t need to avoid getting tested because they don’t want to go into a hospital. A provincial requirement for all assessment centres is that there’s a separate, marked entrance. That’s the case at both centres located within Grand River Hospital and Cambridge Memorial Hospital.
Booking an appointment also means no lineups or crowds.
And before I go, I just want to say thanks for the next case spike, morons!
Yeah, it was a wonderful day. We all want to get outside. But what in the actual fuck was this?
Ontario Premier Doug Ford says he was “shocked” to see thousands of people — many without masks — gather at Trinity Bellwoods Park on Saturday.
Officials in Toronto said the popular city park — located at Queen St. and Strachan Ave. — was much less crowded and under control on Sunday, after thousands of people gathered and broke COVID-19 physical distancing rules the day before.“I thought it was a rock concert. I was shocked,” Ford said. “It was a beautiful day (Saturday) and people want to get out and have a great time, but the images I saw, we can’t have that right now. It (COVID-19) is still a deadly virus.”
Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders was also disappointed with the ignorant crowds, saying public drinking was a large part of the problem.
“A lot of complaints were coming in from the residents, people urinating, people defecating on their properties,” Saunders said in a television interview. “When you’ve got an elderly woman opening the door and seeing someone defecating, it is quite bothersome.”
You’re so much better than this, Toronto. Even Doug Ford knows that.
