TORONTO – Since today, Ontario has eliminated the vaccination obligation and policies that required testing for Covid-19 in schools, long-term care homes and hospitals.
The path taken by the provincial government is to ease restrictions: last week the Chief Medical Officer of Health of Ontario Kieran Moore made it clear that the province will revoke by April 27 the remaining requirements for masks and emergency orders aimed at curbing the spread of the coronavirus.
Therefore, among a thousand controversies, the vaccination obligation for schools, health facilities and hospitals as well as the mandatory tests for unvaccinated personnel falls. However, individual organizations can continue to maintain their own guidelines: most hospitals have already made it known that they will continue to implement the vaccination obligation. The affected sectors, the government assured, will continue to receive supplies of rapid antigen tests, and health personnel and residents will remain eligible for free PCR testing.
Since today, the province has further relaxed the rules in force for visitors to long-term care homes. Now unvaccinated residents will be able to stay out of the facility that hosts them even at night and are allowed to receive the visit of four of their family members or friends at the same time. Children under the age of five who are not vaccinated will also be able to enter the province’s LTCs.
The vaccination passport has therefore been placed in the attic and the province is preparing to take a further step towards freedom from restrictions next Monday. From March 21, in fact, masks will no longer be in demand in schools, grocery stores, shopping centers and most indoor premises. Masks will remain mandatory for public transport, long-term care, retirement homes and other health facilities, reception centres, prisons and buildings that accommodate people with developmental disabilities.
It will be on April 27 that all remaining directives under the Reopening Ontario Act end. The remaining health regulations are being revoked, including one that legally requires healthcare professionals interacting with suspected Covid-19 patients to wear an N95 mask. The Ministry of Health, however, will still direct health workers to wear personal protective equipment, likely still including N95 masks.
The lifting of the restrictions implemented due to the spread of Covid infections, even if now the virus is in some ways contained, does not reap the favors of a good part of the scientific world. “It’s too early to say whether eliminating the mask requirement is the right move right now,” said Ontario’s Science Advisory Table director Peter Jüni. We would need the data of at least one or two more weeks to say ‘ok, the situation is stable’, let’s take the next step.”
Even in schools there is turmoil: parents and teachers are also worried because the ‘no mask’ date coincides with the return to school after the March Break, or when families travel, meet friends and can therefore contract the virus. Prime Minister Ford and Minister Lecce were adamant and asked the school authorities to follow the government’s directives. After all, Dr. Moore has clearly said that “we must learn to live with Covid”.
