The region’s medical officer hasn’t been told where Simcoe-Muskoka region will land in the province’s colour-coded COVID-19 restrictions framework next week, but he’s hoping it’s red.
Dr. Charles Gardner, top doc at the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit, is advocating for stricter controls in the region because of the prevalence of the B.1.1.7 variant strain that originated in the UK.
“I would make the case we would be better served in red as more protected given that we have the variant of concern,” Gardner said on Tuesday. “In fact, the trend we have had overall has been downward and our indicators are a mix between red and orange, so we shall see where the province falls on this.”
The doctor said it was fully a provincial decision to assign each health unit region a colour and corresponding level of restriction from its framework, which includes tighter controls from green, to yellow, to orange, to red, and finally to grey/lockdown.
“The questions that have come my way have been where will we sit… and at this point, I don’t know,” said Gardner.
The provincial framework includes a set of metrics used to determine which controls should be in place in a region. The indicators include weekly case rate numbers, local health system capacity, public health unit capacity to do contact tracing, the number of outbreaks, the percentage of people who test positive, and the level of community transmission and cases that can’t be linked to other known cases.
He noted he would have preferred the stay-at-home order stay in place a little longer now that students have returned to in-person classrooms.
“I’m going to continue with the messaging regardless of where we end up, it is very wise of us all if we continue to abide by a stay-at-home approach,” he said. “It will cease to be an order but it would remain as an approach that is important for reducing transmission in the community.”
Gardner noted he and others have observed a good correlation between reduced movement and reduced disease transmission.
“This is important now more than ever with the UK variant in our community,” he said.
When the provincewide shutdown was put in place Dec. 26, Simcoe-Muskoka region was in the red zone restrictions of the province’s framework.
Among the controls in the red category of the framework are gathering limits of five people indoors and 25 people outdoors. Restaurants are permitted to have up to 10 patrons seated indoors and must close by 10 p.m. with alcohol sales prohibited after 9 p.m. Sports and recreation facilities may have 10 people in indoor classes and 25 for outdoor classes. Team sports cannot be practised or played except for training. The revised framework, which was updated this week, states retail stores can have up to 50 per cent capacity indoors and supermarkets and pharmacies can have up to 75 per cent capacity.
In the orange zone restrictions, informal gathering limits are up to 10 people indoors and 25 outdoors with organized public events permitted to have up to 50 people indoors and 100 people outdoors. Restaurant capacity is up to 50 patrons seated indoors, and the same goes for sports and recreation facilities. Performing arts facilities can be open with 50 spectators indoors.
You can read the full framework here.
