As of Friday July 17th many parts of Ontario moved into Phase 3 of re-opening. Geographically it is most of the province, however with the GTA as well as the Windsor and Niagara Regions not included most of the provinces population is still in Phase 2.
All I can say is FINALLY!!!
In my, (not always so) humble opinion this should have happened long ago, like at the start of June. But as is often said, better late than never. The author of this miserable and pathetic little blog is fortunate to be living in a Phase 3 area, which means I can now dine in at a restaraunt or go inside a bar to hoist a pint and numerous other activities, if I so choose. And therein lies the most important part, choice. I guess you could say that I'm a Pro-Choice kind of guy.
As everyone knows, the reason emergency measures were brought in was in order to "flatten the curve" and to save our health care system from being overwhelmed. That never happened, Ontario is a province of ~14.5 million without about 500 hospitals across the health care network. Back on June 1 there were less than 800 Covid patients being treated in all of Ontario Hospitals, and only 118 patients in ICUs with 90 of them on ventilators.
Ontario never came close to the nightmare "best case" scenario Ontario Premier Doug Ford told us was forecast by the computer modelled simulations he was given to base decisions on. Ontario was supposed to be looking at 1,300 patients in ICU critical care beds, and again that was if we did really well with social distancing and all the rest. In other words if thousands of tickets weren't handed out to people for things like get togethers and back yard parties, if "yahoos" didn't protest lockdown measures at Queen's Park, if there weren't massive 10,000 person gatherings at a park like Trinity Bellwood, and no large BLM demonstrations. All these activities were supposed to make it even worse. Yet even with all those supposedly horrendous acts we never even got close to the forecasted numbers.
So now we're finally moving into what I'm calling the personal responsibility stage. Businesses that had to sit back and watch the Wal-Marts, and Amazons of the world remain open despite outbreaks in their locations, now finally have a chance to try and stave of bankruptcy. Sadly for many it's already too late, they've shuttered their doors and will never re-open.
Maybe they could have stayed open and done a better job of preventing outbreaks than all the supposedly essential workplaces that were allowed to stay open regardless. That is now a moot point of course, those businesses that have managed to survive despite forced closure can now at least try to salvage something including people's livelihoods.
To those who are losing their minds, terrified that Ontario will turn into disaster areas like New York and New Jersey which lead the U.S. in Covid deaths on a per capita basis....relax. You do not have to patronize any business unless you want to. If you don't think indoor restaraunt dining should be allowed, then don't go, it's not rocket science. And the same goes for bars, gyms, movie theatres or anything else.
I do expect we're going to see case numbers and hospitalization numbers climb, perhaps as high as they were back at the start of June. But that isn't that high in a province of Ontario's size with the number of hosptials we have. Let's face it, SARS-Cov-2 is going to be with us for a long time yet, we can't stay hunkered down for years hoping on a vaccine that ultimately may never come. And even if a vaccine is developed it is very possible it could be no more effective than the seasonal flu shot. Even with a vaccine 8,511 Canadians are reported to have died of influenza in 2018 as per StatsCan, the #6 leading cause of death that year.
It strikes me that reasoned thinking is finally starting to gain some traction in spite of all the fear and panic. Eighteen esteemed medical experts, including Canada's first Chief Public Health Officer (this one with an actual medical degree) have signed a joint letter speaking to what I have been advocating since the start, that Canada as a whole needs to start managing Covid instead of trying to eliminate it. Micromanaging human behaviour in an effort to stamp out a virus has always been an exercise akin to herding cats.
I know some will ignore the letter, but for those who are still capable of critical thinking here's the link:
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