Covid And The Rest of Us

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ronandannette

I gave myself this tag and I "Like" myself too!
Joined
May 4, 2006
There are obviously a lot of Covid-related threads discussing many different aspects of the pandemic but I'd like to hear from non-American DIS'ers on how it's going where you are. It seems for most of us that our situations are very different in scope than what's going on in the US and our comments and perspectives are largely irrelevant in relation to them.

I'll start: Here in Alberta we're headed back into the weeds. We've had the third highest number of cases of any province in Canada and although our numbers pale in comparison to Quebec and Ontario, we're now up to 10,390 since March 15 when they started record keeping. We were in strict lock-down from then until June 15 when were down to just a few hundred cases and basically re-opened everything with a bang. We held our own for a few weeks but cases since the beginning of July have increased fast - we're up to over 1,400. Luckily hospitalizations have always been very low (never more than a hundred at any one time) and are currently at 88 province-wide. We've had a total of 186 deaths since March 15, a full 90% of which befell seniors in assisted-living facilities.

There is talk about going back into lock-down but it's faint...I just don't see stuffing that genie back into the bottle. As of mid-April, the government estimates were that over 200,000 jobs were lost out of a population of 4.4 million and our current unemployment rate of 14% is the highest in history. There are 10's of thousands of education professionals alone that risk losing their jobs if schools and universities don't open back up in September, much less all the other industries that are hanging by threads.

Our federal government stepped in early with relief payments (a maximum of $2,000/month) which take the place of regular unemployment insurance, as well as wage subsidies and other forms of assistance for businesses and individuals. No word on how long they will continue but our national economy is in shambles with deficit-spending in the billions. Our border is currently closed to non-essential travel and any Canadian leaving must quarantine for 14 days upon return - no matter where they went. There are a number of provinces that have imposed quarantine requirements on visitors from other provinces as well. Alberta is "open" and Canadians from any region can freely come and go.
 
There are obviously a lot of Covid-related threads discussing many different aspects of the pandemic but I'd like to hear from non-American DIS'ers on how it's going where you are. It seems for most of us that our situations are very different in scope than what's going on in the US and our comments and perspectives are largely irrelevant in relation to them.

I'll start: Here in Alberta we're headed back into the weeds. We've had the third highest number of cases of any province in Canada and although our numbers pale in comparison to Quebec and Ontario, we're now up to 10,390 since March 15 when they started record keeping. We were in strict lock-down from then until June 15 when were down to just a few hundred cases and basically re-opened everything with a bang. We held our own for a few weeks but cases since the beginning of July have increased fast - we're up to over 1,400. Luckily hospitalizations have always been very low (never more than a hundred at any one time) and are currently at 88 province-wide. We've had a total of 186 deaths since March 15, a full 90% of which befell seniors in assisted-living facilities.

There is talk about going back into lock-down but it's faint...I just don't see stuffing that genie back into the bottle. As of mid-April, the government estimates were that over 200,000 jobs were lost out of a population of 4.4 million and our current unemployment rate of 14% is the highest in history. There are 10's of thousands of education professionals alone that risk losing their jobs if schools and universities don't open back up in September, much less all the other industries that are hanging by threads.

Our federal government stepped in early with relief payments (a maximum of $2,000/month) which take the place of regular unemployment insurance, as well as wage subsidies and other forms of assistance for businesses and individuals. No word on how long they will continue but our national economy is in shambles with deficit-spending in the billions. Our border is currently closed to non-essential travel and any Canadian leaving must quarantine for 14 days upon return - no matter where they went. There are a number of provinces that have imposed quarantine requirements on visitors from other provinces as well. Alberta is "open" and Canadians from any region can freely come and go.

Two weeks ago we were down to one active case, no one in the icu and coasting to stage four reopening. Today, we’re at 78 cases, 2 in the icu and one more death, after 83(?) days of no fatalities. We are still in stage 4 reopening but I don’t think too many people are rushing off to the casinos or movie theatres.

Unfortunately, most of our new cases are from Hutterite colonies. Apparently there was a funeral in Alberta or Saskatchewan that was attended by 1600 people (!) and they didn’t isolate when they got back or practice any social distancing so now it’s running through them like wildfire.

We also hear of the idiots who go to restaurants or the mall when they are symptomatic. MORON! stay home if you are showing symptoms. Ugh
 
Two weeks ago we were down to one active case, no one in the icu and coasting to stage four reopening. Today, we’re at 78 cases, 2 in the icu and one more death, after 83(?) days of no fatalities. We are still in stage 4 reopening but I don’t think too many people are rushing off to the casinos or movie theatres.

Unfortunately, most of our new cases are from Hutterite colonies. Apparently there was a funeral in Alberta or Saskatchewan that was attended by 1600 people (!) and they didn’t isolate when they got back or practice any social distancing so now it’s running through them like wildfire.

We also hear of the idiots who go to restaurants or the mall when they are symptomatic. MORON! stay home if you are showing symptoms. Ugh
Not great news but those communities are pretty cloistered to begin with so there may not be much spread to the general populations.

Do you have mandatory masking? We do here on a municipality-by-municipality basis. Calgary's came in a week ago and enforcement begins on August 1.
 
Quebec today : 169 new cases 3 more deaths. Most cases being reported are being attributed to youths, bars, lifeguards, day camps. Masks are mandatory, aside from 1 or 2 incidents that have made the news, it seems to be going well.

ETA : Quebec total numbers 58,897 conf cases - 50,886 recovered- 5,670 deaths. Very sad. We lost a horrifying number of elders in the spring in homes, that leaves me still horrified, and honestly disgusted.

We personally haven’t been out to eat since early March, we would like to try patio dining, but my husband was hospitalized with Covid, and although he is MUCH better, I still remain nervous. From the people in my small circle, they are eating on patios, but no movies, casinos, and nobody is 🧳 travelling anywhere In the country, they are only camping. Possibly because nobody wants us 😂
 
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Not great news but those communities are pretty cloistered to begin with so there may not be much spread to the general populations.

Do you have mandatory masking? We do here on a municipality-by-municipality basis. Calgary's came in a week ago and enforcement begins on August 1.

We don’t have mandatory masking yet but we’ve been warned it’s probably coming soon.
 
Not great news but those communities are pretty cloistered to begin with so there may not be much spread to the general populations.

Do you have mandatory masking? We do here on a municipality-by-municipality basis. Calgary's came in a week ago and enforcement begins on August 1.
Those particular communities easily integrate with wider society. They are always in the malls and grocery stores in the city. Yes, quarantining them would be easy, but it's not typical behaviour that would make anyone not associated with that group feel any safer.
 


@MommyinHonduras - how are you? How are things there? :flower3: I think of you often. A good friend's daughter is married to a Honduran and living there because he can't get even a Visitor's Visa to come to Canada. We haven't talked in a while but I know she's been heart-sick about the conditions there.
 
Mississauga here. Part of the dreaded Peel region, which is one of the hot 3 regions in Ontario right now and will likely remain that way. Very densely populated. Mississauga itself isn’t doing horribly, we have had a day of no new cases but that’s it. Generally under 10 new cases each day. It’s the other big city in our region that’s keeping us in that hot 3, Brampton. They just had a party broken up over the weekend with 200 people attending. We are still phase 2, 200 people should NOT have happened :(. Not sure when we will be moved to phase 3 like the majority of the province but it really wouldn’t affect us much. I don’t see us going to restaurants and movie theatres have chosen to not open yet. I have been to two malls in the last week, straight to the stores I was wanting to go to, wandered around and then back out again. Masks are mandatory and I hate wearing it so I try not to dawdle. They have been mandatory for a couple of weeks now, and I wore mine grocery shopping for a couple months before that.

Biggest concern in my life right now is school. I have a kid in grade 2 and another in grade 7. There’s talk of cohorts, so some would go Monday Tuesday alternating Wednesday’s and the others would go Thursday Friday alternating Wednesday’s. With my luck my kids would be opposites. I am mostly a SAHM, with a job doing lunch supervision at my daughters school (the little one). I’m unsure if I’m returning to that, I do have issues that put me in the high risk category so waiting to see what the school day may look like. If I’m just there an hour I may still do it. Heck, they may not even do lunch supervisors this year. We still don’t know!!!
 
I should add that Manitoba is an anomaly. We only have had 405 total cases to date (population ~1 million) We lucked out because we were late to have our spring break so we were able to close borders and institute 14 day quarantine before the influx of cases based on what we had seen happen in other provinces. We also didn’t get it running through care homes like other provinces.
 
Mississauga here. Part of the dreaded Peel region, which is one of the hot 3 regions in Ontario right now and will likely remain that way. Very densely populated. Mississauga itself isn’t doing horribly, we have had a day of no new cases but that’s it. Generally under 10 new cases each day. It’s the other big city in our region that’s keeping us in that hot 3, Brampton. They just had a party broken up over the weekend with 200 people attending. We are still phase 2, 200 people should NOT have happened :(. Not sure when we will be moved to phase 3 like the majority of the province but it really wouldn’t affect us much. I don’t see us going to restaurants and movie theatres have chosen to not open yet. I have been to two malls in the last week, straight to the stores I was wanting to go to, wandered around and then back out again. Masks are mandatory and I hate wearing it so I try not to dawdle. They have been mandatory for a couple of weeks now, and I wore mine grocery shopping for a couple months before that.

Biggest concern in my life right now is school. I have a kid in grade 2 and another in grade 7. There’s talk of cohorts, so some would go Monday Tuesday alternating Wednesday’s and the others would go Thursday Friday alternating Wednesday’s. With my luck my kids would be opposites. I am mostly a SAHM, with a job doing lunch supervision at my daughters school (the little one). I’m unsure if I’m returning to that, I do have issues that put me in the high risk category so waiting to see what the school day may look like. If I’m just there an hour I may still do it. Heck, they may not even do lunch supervisors this year. We still don’t know!!!

That party in Brampton 😳 I dunno, it’s all over the news. Crazy, but just as crazy, we will be allowed as of August 3rd or 4th to have 250 people, below is the official announcement. Mind blowing. 😕. Quebec of all places, I am afraid for the fall, and am now stocking up like crazy.


The maximum number of people who can attend indoor or outdoor events in public venues will increase from 50 to 250 on Aug. 3,

You do have some thought concerns and choices there for sure,
 
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That party in Brampton 😳 I dunno, it’s all over the news. Crazy, but just as crazy, we will be allowed as of August 3rd or 4th to have 250 people, below is the official announcement. Mind blowing. 😕. Quebec of all places, I am afraid fir the fall, and am now stocking up like crazy.


The maximum number of people who can attend indoor or outdoor events in public venues will increase from 50 to 250 on Aug. 3,

You do have some thought concerns and choices there for sure,
There are theoretically no limits on indoor gatherings PROVIDED personal distancing can be maintained. For example, churches here have approval to resume services at their own discretion. Small congregations like mine have handled it by having City by-law enforcement measure the sanctuaries and calculate the number of people that can be inside. We then have people sign up to attend each service and run extras if needed to accommodate everyone. Larger churches have chosen not to resume gathering yet and some others are holding their services outdoors, where there is no size limit. This has been going on since mid-June and so far there have been no reports of outbreaks originating in places of worship.
 
Can EU-Dis'ers join the conversation? :)

For the Netherlands, we see the following:
- Last week 1329 new cases.
- R figure 1.4
- Positive test rate: 1.0%
- 20-60 year olds see a steeper increase than other age groups
We had some clusters, a group of students can be traced to a party together, also a bar in the south was a cluster, etc.
In my own home town we have 10 new cases, but they cannot trace it back to one source.

No mandatory masks, except in public transportation. Keep your distance. Reservations for all tourist attractions.
 
I never knew just how bad media twists things.

They always show a house party or crowded beach here in Toronto. In reality, most people are wearing masks and distancing. I went to an extremely busy Costco yesterday and 100% of people were wearing masks. Most people cross the street when they see other people.

We are a city of 3 million, and yesterday we had our record low of 6 cases.

The problem is it’s so hard to maintain. Once borders and school open up, it will be near impossible to have such low numbers.
 
I never knew just how bad media twists things.

They always show a house party or crowded beach here in Toronto. In reality, most people are wearing masks and distancing. I went to an extremely busy Costco yesterday and 100% of people were wearing masks. Most people cross the street when they see other people.

We are a city of 3 million, and yesterday we had our record low of 6 cases.

The problem is it’s so hard to maintain. Once borders and school open up, it will be near impossible to have such low numbers.

I think the borders will be closed for a looooooong time.
 
That party in Brampton 😳 I dunno, it’s all over the news. Crazy, but just as crazy, we will be allowed as of August 3rd or 4th to have 250 people, below is the official announcement. Mind blowing. 😕. Quebec of all places, I am afraid for the fall, and am now stocking up like crazy.


The maximum number of people who can attend indoor or outdoor events in public venues will increase from 50 to 250 on Aug. 3,

You do have some thought concerns and choices there for sure,

Because we are still phase 2 the max on gatherings I believe is still 10, so the house party was incredibly out of line, so bad. It increases to 100 in phase 3, but still need social distancing measures. You can be sure a house party didn’t worry about that!
 
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