Toronto, Canada's biggest city and the country's financial hub, has been in shutdown since last November. And the restrictions will not be going away for a while. (CBC/Evan Mitsui/CBC)

Facing a growing COVID crisis, Ford shuts down Ontario for the next four weeks

Premier Doug Ford announced today that he is putting Ontario–Canada’s richest and most populous province–under lockdown for the next four weeks.

The so-called “emergency break” provisions take effect Saturday across the province. 

“We are facing a serious situation and drastic measures are required to contain the rapid spread of the virus, especially the new variants of concern,” Ford said in a statement.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s government announced Thursday that it’s putting the entire province under new restrictions for 28 days. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn)

“I know pulling the emergency brake will be difficult on many people across the province, but we must try and prevent more people from getting infected and overwhelming our hospitals. Our vaccine rollout is steadily increasing, and I encourage everyone who is eligible to get vaccinated. That is our best protection against this deadly virus.”

The announcement comes as new modelling by the provincial government’s COVID-19 Science Advisory Table warns that the daily case count could rise to 6,000 a day by the end of the month due to the presence of the virus’s deadly variant–nearly tripling the current number of daily cases.

And it comes as COVID cases in Ontario have more than doubled since the first week of March while vaccines have not arrived quickly enough to slow the spread of more contagious and deadlier variants of the virus among the general population.

Ontario Premier Doug Ford watches a health-care worker prepare a dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine at a University Health Network vaccine clinic in Toronto on Jan. 7. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Nathan Denette)

As well, the province hit a record high on Wednesday for the number of COVID-19 patients in ICUs. 

At a news conference Wednesday, Ford said he was “extremely concerned” about both rising ICU admissions and daily case counts.

While the measures are not as tight as the province-wide lockdown that was imposed in December, they will affect virtually everyone, and the government is asking everyone to limit trips outside the home to necessities such as food, medication and other essential services.

Under the shutdown rules:

  • Indoor gatherings are only allowed with members of the same household while outdoor gatherings are limited to five people and physical distancing must be maintained.
  • Weddings, funerals and other religious services are capped at 15 per cent capacity indoors.
  • Non-essential retail stores are permitted to open but with occupancy capped at 25 per cent of maximum, while essential retail outlets such as grocery stores are limited to 50 per cent occupancy.
  • Restaurants can only offer delivery and take-out services in the shutdown zone and no indoor dining will be allowed.
  • Construction will remain open and some outdoor activities.
  • All sports and recreational facilities are closed with the exception of day camps and childcare.
  • Ski hills, golf courses, and driving ranges are closed.
  • Personal care services such as hair salons are closed.
  • Casinos and bingo halls, cinemas and performing arts facilities are closed.
  • Schools remain open because, the government says, they are crucial to students’ mental health.

The new restrictions are virtually identical to those currently in place in areas already in lockdown.

However, the CBC’s Mike Crawley reports the province has also created a new category of restrictions on its website called “shutdown.”

Crawley writes that “the only difference between this and the current lockdown provisions currently seen in some areas of the province appears to be the closure of patio dining and golf courses, alongside a limit of five people instead of 10 for outdoor gatherings.”

People are seen outside the Rideau Centre in Ottawa last December as they tried to complete their holiday shopping before a provincewide lockdown took effect on Boxing Day. (Andrew Lee/CBC)

Two-thirds of the province’s public health units are currently under what the government calls lockdown (grey zone) or control (red zone) restrictions.

And despite being under shutdown since last November, Toronto, Canada’s biggest city and the country’s financial hub, remains Canada’s biggest COVID hot spot.

More than half of the cases reported on Wednesday were in Toronto and Peel, a suburban region just west of the city. 

Ontario’s hospital intensive care units had 421 patients critically ill with COVID-19 as of Tuesday, more than at the worst point of the pandemic’s second wave. (CBC/Sam Nar)

For the past week, Ontario has reported an average of about 2,300 new cases of COVID-19 per day, including 2,333 cases and 15 deaths on Wednesday when the province hit its record high for the number of COVID-19 patients in ICUs. 

Critical Care Services Ontario counted 421 hospital patients with COVID-19-related critical illness in intensive care as of midnight after 32 patients were admitted to ICUs on Tuesday.

That followed a record 46 admissions on Monday. 

The previous peak of 420 came in mid-January, during the height of the second wave of the pandemic.

With files from CBC News (Mike Crawley) The Canadian Press

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