Ontario to release opening plan 'very soon:' Health Minister

Torontosun.com
May 19, 2021

The Ontario government will release its opening plan for the province “very soon,” Health Minister Christine Elliott says.

The government will not recycle its COVID-19 colour-coded framework which created a patchwork of rules across the province ranging from the lightest restrictions in green zones to lockdown measures in grey zones.

Ontario to release opening plan 'very soon:' Health Minister

“We have been working with the chief medical officer of health and medical experts on a safe and careful reopening of Ontario because the last thing you want is to go into it too quickly and get into a fourth wave,” Elliott said Tuesday. “We have to do everything we can to avoid that. So that we are working on that. We expect it will be available very soon.”

As the number of daily cases trends downwards and the weather warms up, the Doug Ford government is under increasing pressure to reopen golf courses, tennis courts, summer camps and a multitude of other recreational activities.

The province’s latest stay-at-home order ends June 2.

The government has already indicated it would like to see kids’ summer camps open by July and would consider allowing golf courses to welcome back customers even before June 2.

In deciding whether to reopen the province, the government will look beyond just vaccination rates to intensive care admissions and the rate at which COVID-19 is spreading in the province, Elliott said.

Although the colour-coded framework is out, the province is considering sector-specific timelines.

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said the government needs to have “learned its lessons” and heed the advice of experts in developing its reopening plan.

“This government from day one has been very slow in its response to COVID-19 in every way,” Horwath said. “We can’t make the same mistakes again and end up in another wave of this virus.”

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Liberal MPP John Fraser said the Ford government ignored science table warnings and reopened too quickly earlier this year.

“And as a result, we ended up in this third wave,” Fraser said. “The government has either not listened to or misrepresented the advice that they got … It’s resulted in longer harder lockdowns.”