From what I have heard and read, the medical community in Winnipeg is upset with the new code red restrictions because they do not go far enough. One of the biggest exemptions they are bringing up is how lax they are being with religious gatherings that have been the primary source of infection for many First Nations communities in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. One thing is clear, Manitoba is doing a crappy job in explaining or justifying what they choose to close, partially close or leave open. People are perpetually confused. This includes the restrictions for gatherings at home which seemingly allow a maximum of 5 people in addition to those resident in the homes (it was 10 while we were in code orange). That seems like a recipe for disaster (which it proved to be thanks to Thanksgiving celebrations).
Full lockdown would mean nobody who lives outside your home is allowed in and that is what we dealt with back in April. When things eased up, many of us just limited social gatherings to outdoor spaces in small diads or triads in outdoor spaces (parks, backyard, private patio). As things further eased, some cautious people identified their own extended bubble of many one to three people that they might invite indoors but still using social distancing and hand sanitizers and other precautions.
And of course, considerations need to be made for vulnerable people who do not have homes or family to be with. The Main Street Project and One Just City (along with other missions) are doing their best to ensure their safety and wellbeing. In fact, those organizations have been given funding to ramp up their facilities and services.
Does the situation suck for many, many people. Absolutely. It is not great on anyone's mental wellbeing to be denied social time with family and friends (especially hard when travel is involved). It is also hard on earnings for many people inspite of emergency relief measures put in place. I am working at 50% and maybe even less with this new surge and my partner who managed to keep working full time will probably be down to 25% in hours given the code red status. It is by no means a walk in the park for anyone - some more than others. WE KNOW THIS.
the City of Winnipeg is suspending all of its recreation and leisure programs and services, including Leisure Guide programming, and closing all city-owned-and-operated recreation facilities, gyms, indoor pools, arenas, and libraries," the city stated in a news release on Friday.
Those are not facilities the homeless get to hang out in no matter how cold outside. In Montreal a hotel is being opened up to use as a rooming house until March 31st. Shelter capacity is being increased and warming centres are being opened.
You have a preexisting preference for which you go hunting to find reasons to support. Your focus is not the homeless it is on keeping facilities opened. Next you will say people need these places for their mental health or something else again ignoring the fact that we are short on PPEs and staff.
Your sources are garbage. I watched that other video from the woman you called a truth-teller in which she spend 22 minutes explaining why a completely immaginary claim nobody made is wrong. She suckered you and you have not admitted it. You thought someone had at least inferred that all excess deaths were covid deaths. Pure propaganda.
If the best you can do is to insult my intelligence that is pretty sad.
From what I have heard and read, the medical community in Winnipeg is upset with the new code red restrictions because they do not go far enough.
When those medical experts have spent long days outside in winter day after day or are making less than the equivalent of $15/hour and can speak to that reality from first-hand experience, I will maybe consider their view that lockdown should go into effect.
Besides, the opinions of the "medical community" are very complex. It's only the medical experts who support lockdown that are receiving attention because that reinforces the media narrative. You're not hearing from medical experts who question unless you search things out yourself and you do your own research.
laine lowe wrote:
One of the biggest exemptions they are bringing up is how lax they are being with religious gatherings that have been the primary source of infection for many First Nations communities in Manitoba and Saskatchewan.
So far I am aware of one full-blown outbreak and a few known exposures. Besides, everybody knows there is a risk to coronavirus, and these gatherings can be a place where they can find emotional, social, and community support. What right does anybody have to tell them where they can and cannot gather?
laine lowe wrote:
This includes the restrictions for gatherings at home which seemingly allow a maximum of 5 people in addition to those resident in the homes (it was 10 while we were in code orange). That seems like a recipe for disaster (which it proved to be thanks to Thanksgiving celebrations).
What consenting adults do in their own homes and who they allow in are nobody's business, pandemic or no, and I really don't want to see expansion of any police or surveillance infrastructure go towards this enforcement, especially since we know it will be retained and then redirected against left-wing activits once the pandemic is over. Besides, I don't really trust the claim that private house gathering spread covid any more than they would spread any other infectious disease. So far that claim has been made by politicians and government ministers who constantly lie to the public, and media organizations that have a great deal to gain by making everyone scared of covid. It's the same story we heard all the time: Easter/Mother's Day/Victoria Day/Canada Day/August Long/Labour Day/Thanksgiving, almost on cue timed just to strike fear into people's hearts. Has anybody offered up any actual evidence that this is the case?
laine lowe wrote:
And of course, considerations need to be made for vulnerable people who do not have homes or family to be with. The Main Street Project and One Just City (along with other missions) are doing their best to ensure their safety and wellbeing. In fact, those organizations have been given funding to ramp up their facilities and services.
I live a few blocks away from an urban drop-in centre downtown. When the pandemic hit, they had to close their doors inside and all they could do was have people line up, grab their lunches, and go on their way. Had health officials consulted with them, I'm sure they would have said, "this drop-in provides a vital service to these people, and we believe that the threats to their physical and mental health from not having this space open far outweigh the risk of the coronavirus."
laine lowe wrote:
Does the situation suck for many, many people. Absolutely. It is not great on anyone's mental wellbeing to be denied social time with family and friends (especially hard when travel is involved). It is also hard on earnings for many people inspite of emergency relief measures put in place.
And that can very easily trigger health problems that are more severe and long-lasting than what the pandemic would have been. If a lockdown saves a person's life from covid, only to trigger poor habits that compromise that person's health and those habits result in a premature death down the road, I don't see how that can be defended from a public health perspective.
Maybe I would be more open to lockdowns if I believed they did some good, but I honestly believe that for the most part, the virus does what it wants to and lockdowns only give people the illusion of control over the pandemic. Even here in Manitoba, cases continued to go up even after it was mandatory for everybody to wear masks in any indoor spaces for a month. New case numbers are down in Manitoba sharply from where they were a few days ago, which cannot be explained by the lockdown measures. The new infection curve looks like it's at the crest in Ontario and (while bouncing around somewhat on each day) in Quebec. Saskatchewan is doing very well compared to us (have they ever had a new daily case count in the triple digits?), and I think a big factor is a higher level of population immunity from their multiple outbreaks in the spring. Furthermore, case numbers are a bit misleading. I was talking to someone the other day who had to isolate after testing positive for covid even without showing symptoms. Positive cases can range anywhere from asymptomatic to a miserable cough and sore throat to flat-tired on one's back to in an ICU. Is there any actual public health reason to publish case numbers, especially since it depends in large part on the amount of testing?
I can deal with stress and depression being in my life for the next 5-10 years over being hospitalized in ICU and mabye never leaving in the immediate future. It's as simple as that in my view. Acute disease treatment always trumps chronic disease treatment - or at least it should. The whole practice of triage in based on that assumption.
I live a few blocks away from an urban drop-in centre downtown. When the pandemic hit, they had to close their doors inside and all they could do was have people line up, grab their lunches, and go on their way. Had health officials consulted with them, I'm sure they would have said, "this drop-in provides a vital service to these people, and we believe that the threats to their physical and mental health from not having this space open far outweigh the risk of the coronavirus."
I'm pretty sure you are wrong about that. I haven't heard of any complaining of being shut down. They want to protect their workers and clients from Covid too. We are expanding services (not enough) but hotels are being transformed into shelters, warming centres are planned etc.
I was just in touch with "1 Just City" and they are still operating and providing services, even if limited by COVID-19 safety precautions. Here is a link that describes what they are doing during the pandemic:
I live a few blocks away from an urban drop-in centre downtown. When the pandemic hit, they had to close their doors inside and all they could do was have people line up, grab their lunches, and go on their way. Had health officials consulted with them, I'm sure they would have said, "this drop-in provides a vital service to these people, and we believe that the threats to their physical and mental health from not having this space open far outweigh the risk of the coronavirus."
I'm pretty sure you are wrong about that. I haven't heard of any complaining of being shut down. They want to protect their workers and clients from Covid too. We are expanding services (not enough) but hotels are being transformed into shelters, warming centres are planned etc.
I'm pretty sure since I live in the area and know people connected to this drop-in that I know what I'm talking about.
I was just in touch with "1 Just City" and they are still operating and providing services, even if limited by COVID-19 safety precautions. Here is a link that describes what they are doing during the pandemic:
I live a few blocks away from an urban drop-in centre downtown. When the pandemic hit, they had to close their doors inside and all they could do was have people line up, grab their lunches, and go on their way. Had health officials consulted with them, I'm sure they would have said, "this drop-in provides a vital service to these people, and we believe that the threats to their physical and mental health from not having this space open far outweigh the risk of the coronavirus."
I'm pretty sure you are wrong about that. I haven't heard of any complaining of being shut down. They want to protect their workers and clients from Covid too. We are expanding services (not enough) but hotels are being transformed into shelters, warming centres are planned etc.
I'm pretty sure since I live in the area and know people connected to this drop-in that I know what I'm talking about.
Then why didn't you just say that the management running the place was against the closure?
Manitoba is facing a widespread business shutdown for the second time in the pandemic — but this time, big-box stores aren't voluntarily closing their doors.
Under the latest restrictions for retailers in the province, which came into effect Thursday, all non-essential retail stores are required to close to in-person shopping.
But that doesn't apply to many big-box stores, which — because of the products they sell — fall under the "essential businesses" umbrella.
In March, when uncertainty with the first wave of the pandemic was peaking, many big retailers willingly closed up shop. Some of them were always considered essential, based on the wording of Manitoba's public health orders, but they chose to reopen to in-store customers at their own pace.
Now, these retailers are choosing to still welcome customers — and the perception is that Manitoba's second broad shutdown isn't as strict as the first.
So it looks like the big players have an unfair advantage here. Couldn't you argue that from a containment perspective, it's better to have many small businesses open? That way there are smaller clusters of people spread out throughtout many stores, rather than forcing a larger number into the few larger stores that are open.
The hypocrisy of these people is quite galling. First there was this insistence that it was a moral obligation to stay home unless absolutely necessary. Then the lockdown protests began. When protesters spoke to the negative societal and health impacts of the lockdown, they were dismissed out of hand, pathologized, and made to be evil people who don't care about the spread of the coronavirus. Then BLM took to the street, and since the left agrees with BLM, suddenly it's okay to gather in large groups. Then Trump rallies began to happen, and suddenly it was not okay to attend those, even though those in attendance would have known and accepted the risk they were taking. The left even accepted arguments about racism killing more people than covid after dismissing a similar line of arguments from the lockdown protest. Now there are ridiculous rules and regulations coming out about Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings, but celebrating Biden's win is now okay? If it is a moral obligation that people have to stay home to stop the coronavirus, then that has to apply across the board. You can't ask people to give up things that are meaningful to them, like family gatherings or singing in church, and then suddenly say the rules don't apply when it's something you agree with.
I don't even think they truly understand the damage they are doing to public health guidance. Yes, the Republicans have undertaken a crusade against science and reason. Yes, there are times when experts and scientists have to stand up and say, "despite what public perception says, here are the facts." Unfortunately educated professionals too often come across as if to say, "I'm educated and you lesser people should listen to me and respect my knowledge." That not only turns people off, but plays right into the hands of Republicans. Also, if you take a look at this graph, you will see a strong relationship between how people vote and their likelihood of following health guidance. If that relationship is strong, that puts everyone in more danger, because threats to public health do not care how you vote. What's coming even clearer is that we are being subjected to emotional blackmail, gaslighting, and psychological terrorism that is masquerading as public health guidance, and more people are catching onto that. The danger here is that it damages people's trust in public health guidance to the point that they will simply refuse to follow it.
Nearly half of Black small businesses had been wiped out by the end of April as the pandemic ravaged minority communities disproportionately, according to a report from the New York Fed.
Black-owned businesses were more than twice as likely to shutter as their white counterparts, the report found.
"Nationally representative data on small businesses indicate that the number of active business owners fell by 22% from February to April 2020—the largest drop on record," the report said.
"Black businesses experienced the most acute decline, with a 41% drop. Latinx business owners fell by 32% and Asian business owners dropped by 26%."
That figure has likely increased substantially as the pandemic has dragged on with a resurgence of cases this summer that has taken the country’s number of infections to a world record of over 5 million.
The number of white-owned small firms, in contrast, fell just 17%.
Sweden has banned gatherings of more than 8 people as a second wave of coronavirus continues to grow. "Don't go to gyms, don't go to libraries, don't host dinners. Cancel," Swedish Prime Minister Lofven said.
The Atlantic bubble is also no more and partial lockdowns are being introduced (25% capacity on retail, closure of gyms, museums, casinos, libraries, bars, etc - only food take out or delivery for restaurants, etc).
As any infectious disease expert could have predicted, once we came out of lockdown, the virus was going to come back. That was especially true of a respiratory virus when it spreads in the winter time. Of the handful of countries that the suppressionist crowd claims as success, Taiwan is the only one of those countries that did not see a recurrence. I wonder why this group looks at that and claims that lockdowns need to be harder, tighter, and stricter, and never seems to question that if only a few countries managed to control the virus, maybe something about the virus is beyond human control.
For the most part, this current wave looks like it's on its way out. We can probably expect a resurgence in the New Year. I'd also expect the virus to come back in the Fall. Do you *really* think even having the threat of shutdowns hanging over our heads any time this virus pops up is any viable or sustainable way to run society in the long term?
The Canada Revenue Agency says it's warning about 213,000 Canadians who may have been paid twice through the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) program that they could be called upon to repay the money.
But repayment isn't required right away, says the agency. The CRA has suspended collection of debts for the duration of the pandemic emergency.
"The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) has issued letters to individuals who may have applied for the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) from both Service Canada and the CRA, and who may be required to repay an amount to the CRA," a CRA spokesperson said in an email. "The letters did not require immediate payment; rather they informed the taxpayer that there may be a requirement to repay amounts received.
"We will resume collections activities when it is responsible to do so, including collection of debts related to CERB payments,"
The CRA was responding to CBC's question about individuals being asked to repay pandemic benefits. The agency says it is still recommending that people pay back any CERB funds to which they're not entitled by the end of the year, warning that if they don't, the sum will appear on T4A tax slips and will need to be reported as income on next year's tax return.
When CERB expires, and peolpe without jobs are forced to pay it back, things are not going to be pretty. Make no mistake, the federal government's economic response was a disaster. CERB just covers that up for the time being and kicks that can down the road.
As any infectious disease expert could have predicted, once we came out of lockdown, the virus was going to come back.
I guess that is because it wasn't actually a lock down. When Wuhan came out of its lock down the virus did not come back because it only lives for so long and if everyone stays at home it doesn't spread and disappears from the population.
As any infectious disease expert could have predicted, once we came out of lockdown, the virus was going to come back.
I guess that is because it wasn't actually a lock down. When Wuhan came out of its lock down the virus did not come back because it only lives for so long and if everyone stays at home it doesn't spread and disappears from the population.
There are some indications that the curve was going to peak on its own independent of the impact the lockdown had. Even so, lockdowns impose other costs, such as disabled children having starved to death as suggested by Edward Snowden. That's the problem with covid zealotry is that people are too focused on covid and they simply ignore or dismiss the costs of the measures taken into effect to fight it. When these drastic measures to stop covid lead to such things as increasing overdose deaths or hundreds of millions of people possibly starving to death in the developing world (compared to just over 60 million covid cases today, and a "case" could mean someone tested positive but never felt sick and had no reason to suspect anything was wrong independent of the test) then these measures have to be considered a public health failure.
As many as 12,000 people could die per day by the end of the year as a result of hunger linked to COVID-19, potentially more than could die from the disease, warned Oxfam in a new briefing published today. The global observed daily mortality rate for COVID-19 reached its highest recorded point in April 2020 at just over 10,000 deaths per day.
‘The Hunger Virus,’ reveals how 122 million more people could be pushed to the brink of starvation this year as a result of the social and economic fallout from the pandemic including through mass unemployment, disruption to food production and supplies, and declining aid.
Oxfam’s Interim Executive Director Chema Vera said:
“COVID-19 is the last straw for millions of people already struggling with the impacts of conflict, climate change, inequality and a broken food system that has impoverished millions of food producers and workers. Meanwhile, those at the top are continuing to make a profit: eight of the biggest food and drink companies paid out over $18 billion to shareholders since January even as the pandemic was spreading across the globe - ten times more than the UN says is needed to stop people going hungry.”
Many US states have no restrictions and I am sure it has made no difference in the number of deaths due to hunger in the global south. Anyway, it seems that if COVID-19 doesn't kill you if you're a resident in a long-term care facility, malnourishment and dehydration certainly will. That is something we can take some control over and demand change from our provincial and federal governments.
Many US states have no restrictions and I am sure it has made no difference in the number of deaths due to hunger in the global south. Anyway, it seems that if COVID-19 doesn't kill you if you're a resident in a long-term care facility, malnourishment and dehydration certainly will. That is something we can take some control over and demand change from our provincial and federal governments.
If migrant workers in industrialized countries were thrown out of work, that may affect remittances they can send home. Disruption of trade routes can also impact economies. It could also be the case that lockdowns in developing countries pushed people into poverty, and that these lockdowns would have had far worse impact than even the worst unmitigated covid spread.
So for people who accuse me of advocating a liberterian approach to the pandemic, I will try to spell out this examlpe one more time:
I still go into my workplace, and I go out to the store myself for groceries. I could, if I wanted to, insist on working from home. I could also have my groceries delivered to me, thereby eliminating a need to ever leave my residence. That would essentially put me in compliance with the letter and the spirit of the public health orders. Meanwhile, someone else has to work in the grocery store and take the risk of covid exposure. The person delivering my groceries also has to take on the occupational hazard of driving in order to get them to me. So while I am completely safe, all the risks are being borne by someone other than me. The virus will still spread in the world around me, it just won't affect me because I'm not in direct contact with anyone. How is that behaviour in any way consistent with a communitarian response?
For example, in Toronto, the incidence rates were the same at the beginning of the pandemic, but after the March 23 lockdowns, detected cases declined in affluent neighborhoods while they skyrocketed in less affluent areas. A similar effect was subsequently observed for mortality (see Figure).
But lockdowns are supposed to stop the spread of the virus. These authors are alleging it has had the opposite impact in working class neighbourhoods. Do they explain why?
Quote:
The Canadian COVID-19 lockdown strategy is the worst assault on the working class in many decades. Low-risk college students and young professionals are protected; such as lawyers, government employees, journalists, and scientists who can work from home; while older high-risk working-class people must work, risking their lives generating the population immunity that will eventually help protect everyone. This is backwards, leading to many unnecessary deaths from both COVID-19 and other diseases.
...
Despite heroic efforts by the public, the nine-month lockdown and contact tracing strategy has tragically failed older Canadians, with 97% of COVID-19 deaths inflicting those over 60. Where it did “succeed” was in shifting the COVID-19 burden from affluent professionals to the less affluent working class.
The emphasis in the above paragraphs is mine.
To reitierate something I said earlier: Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown even said that the lockdown will have no impact on covid spread in the city he leads precisely because a large part of that workforce are "essential workers" who have to go to work to keep the rest of us fed.
Last week, the Mail revealed the shocking story of 93-year-old Lucy Jeal, who recently received a 'surprise' visit at her South London council flat from an NHS 'frailty nursing practitioner'.
The man, whom she'd never seen before, explained that he'd come to talk about her future healthcare and raised the prospect of treatment being withheld should Lucy's heart fail.
Sprightly Lucy, who lives independently, regularly walks to the corner store with her shopping trolley or takes the bus to the supermarket, was understandably upset.
She cooks for herself, is an expert knitter, has a sharp memory, reads a newspaper every day, and looks forward to visits from her devoted family and especially playing with her young great-grandchildren.
All in all, Lucy enjoys a good quality of life and apart from some age-related ailments, she had been rated as 'three' on the NHS Clinical Frailty Scale (one is 'very fit' and nine is 'terminally ill').
Despite all this, the morning after the nurse's unannounced visit to conduct a 'frailty review', an envelope was delivered to Lucy's flat containing an A4-size notice with a stark red border.
Designed to be displayed in her home, it was a 'Do Not Attempt To Resuscitate Order' — known as a DNAR or DNR — and it stated that Lucy should not be resuscitated by doctors, nurses, or emergency paramedics if her heart stopped. It was signed by the frailty nursing practitioner.
'I was shocked the NHS won't save me. If I collapse, they are refusing to put me together again,' Lucy told the Mail.
There are more stories in that article about families feeling pressured into acceping DNR orders.
Here is another question I have for the "everybody-should-work-from-home" crowd. My own workplace has changed its training to train people from home electronically. In other words, to apply to work there, you need some sort of electronic device with an internet connection in order to apply. A former co-worker from that place who was there many years ago simply did not have access to his own computer. Even if libraries or internet cafes were open right now, that would be a problem because of privacy issues. You would need your own private place to train. So assuming other workplaces went to this model, this former co-worker and many others in his position would find fewer places to apply to work. How should this problem be addressed?
Buy a computer or the business should supply one like my kids school and my office did for those that needed it
well, that's the surficial layer. but the folks who build the computers, toil for amazon, mine the metals, and connect the computer don't have the option to "work from home".
but hey, they're off-white, poor and unseen.
it's yet another example of corporate product "solutions" to bio-social problems, as wealth flow upwards to the elites accelerates, and more and more of our lives are driven online to be tracked and manipulated.
don't get me wrong, working from home is part of the toolkit. it's also a lot of other things.
Buy a computer or the business should supply one like my kids school and my office did for those that needed it
1) How is someone who doesn't have a job supposed to get the computer, espeically if they are struggling to put food on the table?
2) You think businesses that are out to make money are going to go to the expense to provide computers for their employees, especially if enough of the population has their own computers to choose from that the businesses don't have to worry about people who don't?
the folks who build the computers, toil for amazon, mine the metals, and connect the computer don't have the option to "work from home".
You mentioned mining the metals. Wouldn't that involve destruction of large amounts of the natural world in order to find those metals? Destruction of the natural world that will throw ecosystems into such a state of unbalance as to risk releasing more new-to-us viruses into the human population? Viruses to which (unlike the coronavirus) we have never encountered and to which nobody is immune?
I have been saying since day one of this pandemic that the man camps in the fracking fields need to be shut down. Here is a report with the latest evidence and the cries for more restrictions from the people in the North, especially the indigenous communities.
Bowering isn’t alone in his calls to shut down work camps.
The open letter from frontline health workers calls for Henry to take “immediate action” and shut down work camps.
“As health professionals, we have a responsibility to uphold the current and future health of these communities, which are now under threat from the continuing of Coastal GasLink (LNG) work and man camps,” the letter says.
Camp 9A in Wet’suwet’en territory near Houston, B.C. Photo: Amber Bracken / The Narwhal
The frontline health workers’ letter is in support of concerns raised by more than 20 Wet’suwet’en matriarchs, or Ts’ako ze’, in an open letter to Henry dated Nov. 30. In that letter, the matriarchs asked the public health officer to reconsider the essential designation given to the oil and gas industry and close work camps, which have also been shown to increase violence against Indigenous women and children and bring a host of social ills.
“Not only have we witnessed an increase in drugs, alcohol and gang-related violence in our communities, we are now faced with a disease that could kill any one of us,” the matriarchs wrote. “In addition to the risk man camps have on our Indigenous women and girls, we are now facing the loss of some of our most sacred elders and chiefs.”
At the time of publication, the Ts’ako ze’ said they had not received a response from the public health officer.
Buy a computer or the business should supply one like my kids school and my office did for those that needed it
1) How is someone who doesn't have a job supposed to get the computer, espeically if they are struggling to put food on the table?
2) You think businesses that are out to make money are going to go to the expense to provide computers for their employees, especially if enough of the population has their own computers to choose from that the businesses don't have to worry about people who don't?
1-How are they supposed to get office clothes or travel to a job without some fund? You can get a cheap laptop for $250 and basic internet cheaply or use your phone as a hotspot
A2, you bring up problems as though lifting the lockdown and overloading hospitals so more people die in Canada is a solution.
The solution on this board if I am reading the consensus properly is minimum basic income.
In Canada the only person that can sign a DNR is the patient not some nurse. I am more concerned about allowing mental health issues as acceptable reasons for assisted suicide. That is not needed in order to allow advance directives for people with fatal degenerative diseases such as ALS.
Concerning the plight of impoverished countries. The solution is to stop making war on them through unfair trade deals not Canadians dying for them.
We all agree that there are negative outcomes on the neediest people in Canada and the world. That is always the case. Overloading hospitals would not help them. If everything opened up eventually too many people would be sick to keep everything open. Covid-19 doesn't respond to political arguments. There is not a single place in the entire world that has been able to remain fully open without first taking drastic measures to prevent it from arriving in the community/province/state/country.
Buy a computer or the business should supply one like my kids school and my office did for those that needed it
1) How is someone who doesn't have a job supposed to get the computer, espeically if they are struggling to put food on the table?
2) You think businesses that are out to make money are going to go to the expense to provide computers for their employees, especially if enough of the population has their own computers to choose from that the businesses don't have to worry about people who don't?
1-How are they supposed to get office clothes or travel to a job without some fund? You can get a cheap laptop for $250 and basic internet cheaply or use your phone as a hotspot2-Yup
Wow that is ignorant. This former co-worker of mine would have struggled to even come up with an extra $250 for the computer, and I'm not sure this former co-worker ever had the internet at home or ever had a cell phone. Iit reminds me of the right-wing trope that people living in poverty don't need higher minimum wages or more generous social support levels, they just need to stop wasting money on alcohol and cigarettes and they would have all the money they need. Not to mention that a laptop that cheap might have performance issues that could interfere with doing the job. Do you think the company would be sympathetic to that? But not to worry, because even if those kinds of jobs are unavailable, this person could work as a delivery driver taking restaurant meals to the stay-at-home crowd. This person is not only taking the risk of exposure to covid, but is also taking on the additional occoupational hazard that comes with driving.
For people who have the priviledge and the luxury to stay home throughout this pandemic (and both of those things are a priviledge and a luxury) why is that not enough? Why this need to control other's behaviour to the point of disallowing them from going to a gym, library, church, to sing in front of an audience, or even to visit other people in their private family resdences? Yet somehow, to the stay-at-home crowd, it's comlpetely acceptable for someone else to expose themselves to covid and take on the occupational hazards of delivering items to them because the stay-at-home crowd is too afraid to leave the house? That hypocrisy sickens me, and the stay-at-home crowd has the gall to claim that people who want to live their lives as we did pre-pandemic are the selfish ones?
A2, you bring up problems as though lifting the lockdown and overloading hospitals so more people die in Canada is a solution.
The data simply do not support this make-believe scenario you are advocating. For one, if you compare infection curves from many different countries, you cannot tell from looking at these cruves when social distancing, lockdowns, and mask mandates went into effect. If you compare areas that did lock down with areas that didn't, you still can't pick them out based on the curves. Furthermore, I have consistently pointed to data suggesting that hosptializations in Ontario, while up, are nowhere near where they were in the spring. Lastly, if it's a question of whether more people will die, there are convincing arguments that the lockdown measures will be responsible for more direct and indirect deaths than would have happened from covid. Finally, there is also evidence that in spite of the attention, that ICUs in the United Kingdom are not higher than one would expect for this time of year.
Pondering wrote:
There is not a single place in the entire world that has been able to remain fully open without first taking drastic measures to prevent it from arriving in the community/province/state/country.
Belarus never locked down in any major way, and even in spite of a large increase in cases right now, has never recorded more than 10 deaths per day. Many of the Eastern European countries (with the obvious exceptions of Poland and Hungary) have also had more relaxed measures than their Western European counterparts.
Buy a computer or the business should supply one like my kids school and my office did for those that needed it
1) How is someone who doesn't have a job supposed to get the computer, espeically if they are struggling to put food on the table?
2) You think businesses that are out to make money are going to go to the expense to provide computers for their employees, especially if enough of the population has their own computers to choose from that the businesses don't have to worry about people who don't?
1-How are they supposed to get office clothes or travel to a job without some fund? You can get a cheap laptop for $250 and basic internet cheaply or use your phone as a hotspot2-Yup
Wow that is ignorant. This former co-worker of mine would have struggled to even come up with an extra $250 for the computer, and I'm not sure this former co-worker ever had the internet at home or ever had a cell phone. Iit reminds me of the right-wing trope that people living in poverty don't need higher minimum wages or more generous social support levels, they just need to stop wasting money on alcohol and cigarettes and they would have all the money they need. Not to mention that a laptop that cheap might have performance issues that could interfere with doing the job. Do you think the company would be sympathetic to that? But not to worry, because even if those kinds of jobs are unavailable, this person could work as a delivery driver taking restaurant meals to the stay-at-home crowd. This person is not only taking the risk of exposure to covid, but is also taking on the additional occoupational hazard that comes with driving.
For people who have the priviledge and the luxury to stay home throughout this pandemic (and both of those things are a priviledge and a luxury) why is that not enough? Why this need to control other's behaviour to the point of disallowing them from going to a gym, library, church, to sing in front of an audience, or even to visit other people in their private family resdences? Yet somehow, to the stay-at-home crowd, it's comlpetely acceptable for someone else to expose themselves to covid and take on the occupational hazards of delivering items to them because the stay-at-home crowd is too afraid to leave the house? That hypocrisy sickens me, and the stay-at-home crowd has the gall to claim that people who want to live their lives as we did pre-pandemic are the selfish ones?
He could not, in that case, take a job delivering meals or groceries since both those jobs require a cellphone.
Buy a computer or the business should supply one like my kids school and my office did for those that needed it
1) How is someone who doesn't have a job supposed to get the computer, espeically if they are struggling to put food on the table?
2) You think businesses that are out to make money are going to go to the expense to provide computers for their employees, especially if enough of the population has their own computers to choose from that the businesses don't have to worry about people who don't?
1-How are they supposed to get office clothes or travel to a job without some fund? You can get a cheap laptop for $250 and basic internet cheaply or use your phone as a hotspot2-Yup
Wow that is ignorant. This former co-worker of mine would have struggled to even come up with an extra $250 for the computer, and I'm not sure this former co-worker ever had the internet at home or ever had a cell phone. Iit reminds me of the right-wing trope that people living in poverty don't need higher minimum wages or more generous social support levels, they just need to stop wasting money on alcohol and cigarettes and they would have all the money they need. Not to mention that a laptop that cheap might have performance issues that could interfere with doing the job. Do you think the company would be sympathetic to that? But not to worry, because even if those kinds of jobs are unavailable, this person could work as a delivery driver taking restaurant meals to the stay-at-home crowd. This person is not only taking the risk of exposure to covid, but is also taking on the additional occoupational hazard that comes with driving.
For people who have the priviledge and the luxury to stay home throughout this pandemic (and both of those things are a priviledge and a luxury) why is that not enough? Why this need to control other's behaviour to the point of disallowing them from going to a gym, library, church, to sing in front of an audience, or even to visit other people in their private family resdences? Yet somehow, to the stay-at-home crowd, it's comlpetely acceptable for someone else to expose themselves to covid and take on the occupational hazards of delivering items to them because the stay-at-home crowd is too afraid to leave the house? That hypocrisy sickens me, and the stay-at-home crowd has the gall to claim that people who want to live their lives as we did pre-pandemic are the selfish ones?
He could not, in that case, take a job delivering meals or groceries since both those jobs require a cellphone.
So he gets to be unemployed then. Really progressive, and so disgusting that this is the reality that the "stay-at-home" crowd has encouraged without any regard for people thrown under the bus when they are safe at home.
This proves my point that the "work-from-home" trend will leave people behind, and there is no concern about that at all.
MOSCOW — Belarus will close its land borders to its own citizens later this month to try to combat COVID-19, the government said late on Wednesday, a move the country’s opposition leader likened to imprisoning the population in a Stalin-era prison camp.
The relatively low death rate is thought to be thanks to Belarus’s large hospital capacity which allowed the country to isolate people early on, says Andrei Vitushka, a healthcare policy expert at the Belarusian Institute for Strategic Studies in Vilnius, Lithuania.
With 11 hospital beds per 1000 people, Belarus outnumbers nations like Germany (8) or the UK (2.5).1 “It’s usually a problem because it takes a lot of money to maintain them, but it turned into our advantage in this situation,” says Vitushka, who is also an intensive care physician in Belarus.
“Belarus, like most of the post-Soviet states, has a focus on “sanitary epidemiological problems” meaning large scale health scares like a pandemic,” says Rasmus Nilsson, a teaching fellow at University College London’s school of Slavonic and east European studies.
This may be one reason Belarus also outperformed most of Europe in terms of mass testing during the first four months of the pandemic. While many countries were reluctant to carry out extensive testing, according to the state owned news agency BelTA, testing in Belarus started as early as 23 January. Most kits were donated or purchased from China and Russia2 using government funds and donations from companies3 and ordinary citizens.4 The country stepped up testing in early April,5 developing its own rapid testing kits6 and switching to the use of domestically produced reagents for polymerase chain reaction testing in May.7 According to government information, there are now 32 laboratories processing samples across the country and testing is widespread in hospitals as well as from GPs.
Again, we need look no farther than our own borders. We don't need a shred of evidence from the rest of the world. We have 9 months of experience therefore our own numbers.
We know what our hospital capacity is. We know how long the delay is between diagnosis and hospital admissions and deaths. It is a three to four week lead time. That is enough for health care professionals to predict when they will run out of beds and staff. They tell the government in X weeks we will have to turn away patients. Health care professionals have nothing to gain from shutdowns. They aren't bucking for more money. They are quitting. Statistics showing health care professionals are at greater risk than the general population are not fake.
During the first wave surgeries had to be cancelled. Cancer treatments had to be cancelled. Hip surgeries had to be cancelled.
Explain to me why you think our health care professionals at every level, from nurses right up to hospital administrations are warning the government they can't handle the flow of patients.
Health care workers, like delivery workers and grocery workers etc. don't get to stay home. Explain to me why you think it is fine to force medical personnel to quit or risk their lives on behalf of others when it is unnecessary?
That some workers can't work from home or have essential jobs is reality. That one person must take risks does not mean the fair thing to do is to make everyone else also take risks. If the risk could be split that would make sense but making office workers keep working outside the home would not reduce the risk for essential workers. It would increase the risk to essential workers by forcing them to mingle with more people. Keeping grocery stores free of crowding isn't just for the benefit of shoppers. It benefits the workers that have to be there as well.
No one here thinks it is okay that drug addicts and people with mental health issues are suffering even more because of the restrictions but Covid didn't create these problems it only made them more visible and more acute. We definitely should be doing more. Risking the lives of everyone else would not solve the problem it would make it worse. Even more addicts and mentally ill people would be dying as they are always last in line. It would be no different when beds and respirators are being rationed.
No one here thinks it is acceptable for drug addicts to die at any time regardless of Covid. The response to covid didn't create the crisis. Addicts didn't just start dying recently. I think everyone on this board supports full access to medical grade drugs for addicts. We all see it as a medical problem not a law enforcement issue.
Belaris is an excellent example. We should have more beds per capita. It is not something we can have tomorrow. It takes years to train medical professionals and build hospitals. I have been saying for months that it is outrageous that we don't have widespread testing by now so we could limit restrictions. It is outrageous that we don't have enough PPEs even now. It is outrageous that corporations are benefiting from Covid while people suffer. I could list a lot more outrages.
What is not an outrage is restrictions aimed at slowing the spread enough to prevent our health care systems from collapsing. That would be catastrophic. It already has been catastrophic in nursing homes which did collapse under the pressure leaving people to die of dehydration and starvation due to lack of staff. Did you volunteer to do that kind of work because I didn't. I'm not willing to work in a care home or hospital. The least we can do for people who are doing that work is to stay out of their way by remaining at home.
Explain to me why you think our health care professionals at every level, from nurses right up to hospital administrations are warning the government they can't handle the flow of patients.
They haven't provided acutal data to back up their claims espeically relative to other years. In some places where people have actually asked that question, we see that the load on hospitals is not unexpected for this time of year.
Pondering wrote:
Health care workers, like delivery workers and grocery workers etc. don't get to stay home. Explain to me why you think it is fine to force medical personnel to quit or risk their lives on behalf of others when it is unnecessary?
Why do you think it's fine to force people into unsafe situations like domestic abuse and drug overdoses when it's not necessary?
Pondering wrote:
What is not an outrage is restrictions aimed at slowing the spread enough to prevent our health care systems from collapsing.
The restrictions are not working. Here in Manitoba, we have been under tight restrictions for over a month, and it was during this last period when covid had its biggest impacts on care homes and hospitals, the very places you do not want an infection to spread. Patrick Brown, the Mayor of Brampton, said the lockdown on his city was not going to make a difference in spread because so many of his workforce were essential workers. Lockdowns are an illusion of safety to the priviledged middle-aged and retired crowd who has the option to stay home without worrying about their income. Everyone else is thrown under the bus because these people are scared.
And I'll say it again, if a surge in covid patients is going to collapse the health care system, that collapse is inevitable regardless. Not only will surgeries and procedures back up and increase (unless some of these people die while waiting, but hey, that is an acceptable sacrifice to the "I'm-scared-of-covid" crowd) but there will be more people needing these procedures. You also have to consider additional strain on the system from the despair brought on by the measures, to increased drug overdoses, increased acloholism, to even outright violence and open social unrest breaking loose on the streets. I can tell you from what I've seen in Winnipeg that that last item is a very realistic possibility.
Some Canadians say they were shocked and alarmed to learn they may have to pay back thousands of dollars in pandemic benefits after receiving letters from the Canada Revenue Agency last week suggesting they may not have qualified for the Canada emergency response benefit in the first place.
The CRA is encouraging Canadians who got the letters to pay back the CERB by Dec. 31 so it does not negatively affect their tax returns.
Recipients of the letters have told CBC News they are being targeted because they used their gross income, including expenses. For a self-employed person that could include work-related cell phone bills or equipment needed to do their work.
The bill is coming due. All that money to tank our economy, run up the deficit, and what do we have to show for it? Just using that cash to protect elder care homes would have had much better results.
The bill is coming due. All that money to tank our economy, run up the deficit, and what do we have to show for it? Just using that cash to protect elder care homes would have had much better results.
The workers can fend for themselves, right? Giving out money to people who were unemployed was a bad idea?
They haven't provided acutal data to back up their claims espeically relative to other years. In some places where people have actually asked that question, we see that the load on hospitals is not unexpected for this time of year.
In Quebec we have had numbers of nurses quitting. We have had to call in the army. I trust nurses (collectively) more than I do any other profession. I do not believe that either they or doctors are lying about conditions in hospitals.
Aristotleded24 wrote:
Why do you think it's fine to force people into unsafe situations like domestic abuse and drug overdoses when it's not necessary?
We don't. Adults make choices. We are not permitted to force them to leave abusive situations or force them into treatment programs. We should still reach out to try to save them but it is not the same as demanding health care workers risk their lives or lose their jobs. In Quebec the shelter system improved for many because hotels are being used.
Aristotleded24 wrote:
The restrictions are not working. Here in Manitoba, we have been under tight restrictions for over a month, and it was during this last period when covid had its biggest impacts on care homes and hospitals, the very places you do not want an infection to spread. Patrick Brown, the Mayor of Brampton, said the lockdown on his city was not going to make a difference in spread because so many of his workforce were essential workers.
That is for Manitoba to figure out. I have said all along, look to your local situation. We can get general information from all around the world but not two places have the exact same situation. It doesn't apply in Quebec and restrictions in Canada are provincial and municipal not Federal. No where in Canada has had a lockdown. If your doctors and nurses can manage then more power to them. I fully supported the Atlantic bubble. I fully support BC's measures. Ontario and Quebec not so much.
Concerning numbers going up after restrictions have been applied it makes perfect sense. Hospital admissions are delayed 3 to 4 weeks after people catch it. When testing indicates more people are getting sick than the hospital can manage a month later that is when the restrictions come into place. The numbers keep going up for weeks after that. Even so I am 100% in favor of Manitoba doing what it sees fits their situation best.
Aristotleded24 wrote:
Lockdowns are an illusion of safety to the priviledged middle-aged and retired crowd who has the option to stay home without worrying about their income.
It isn't an illusion. I am safer staying home, and there have been no lockdowns in Canada. Wuhan locked down. We haven't even had a curfew.
Aristotleded24 wrote:
Everyone else is thrown under the bus because these people are scared.
The only people being "thrown under the bus" are people being forced to work in non-essential jobs. I can stay home no matter what anyone does. So can all the people who have the option of working from home. Are you suggesting they should be forced to go to offices?
Aristotleded24 wrote:
And I'll say it again, if a surge in covid patients is going to collapse the health care system, that collapse is inevitable regardless.
That just isn't true. Hospitals have rooms for X number of patients. The system is calibrated to have a percentage of stretch for emergencies like a major multi-vehicle crash or a big fire or a gas explosion. When these things occur off-duty people, even some not on call, rally until the emergency is over. It is not built to be in a perpetual state of emergency.
Aristotleded24 wrote:
Not only will surgeries and procedures back up and increase (unless some of these people die while waiting, but hey, that is an acceptable sacrifice to the "I'm-scared-of-covid" crowd) but there will be more people needing these procedures.
You are making no sense. The reason we flatten the curve is so these other life-saving treatments can go forward. If Covid overwhelms the system then they have to start cancelling anything that isn't immediately life-threatening.
Aristotleded24 wrote:
You also have to consider additional strain on the system from the despair brought on by the measures, to increased drug overdoses, increased acloholism, to even outright violence and open social unrest breaking loose on the streets. I can tell you from what I've seen in Winnipeg that that last item is a very realistic possibility.
I do. Nothing happens in a vacumn. The vast majority of businesses in Quebec are open for business. The majority of restrictions apply to social-distancing and mask-wearing. The most onerous restrictions in Quebec apply to private gatherings and hospitality businesses.
The most vulnerable in society are always the ones to suffer the most be it a fire, hurricane, tital wave or pandemic. That doesn't mean it is wrong for people who can to save themselves to do so. We are not morally required to sacrifice our lives for the lives of others.
Best thing I can do for medical professionals is to stay out of the way. Best thing I can do for those who are stricken with Covid is to stay out of the way. The best thing I can do for people who are forced to work is stay out of their way.
I trust nurses (collectively) more than I do any other profession. I do not believe that either they or doctors are lying about conditions in hospitals.
I agree. When it comes to pandemics primarily I trust immunologists, nurses, doctors, scientists, and other medical and health care professionals. Nurses and doctors are making very significant sacrifices, sometimes even with their lives.
The bill is coming due. All that money to tank our economy, run up the deficit, and what do we have to show for it? Just using that cash to protect elder care homes would have had much better results.
The workers can fend for themselves, right? Giving out money to people who were unemployed was a bad idea?
That's not what I said. If you look to my link, you will note that the workers will have to pay that money back. Once the government decides to end the CERB, people who don't have jobs to go back to because the businesses failed won't have any government support to rely on. That will especially be the case if the next federal election produces a majority government, which will all too happily use the deficit as an excuse to effectively do away with what remains of our social support programs.
Why do you think it's fine to force people into unsafe situations like domestic abuse and drug overdoses when it's not necessary?
We don't. Adults make choices. We are not permitted to force them to leave abusive situations or force them into treatment programs. We should still reach out to try to save them but it is not the same as demanding health care workers risk their lives or lose their jobs. In Quebec the shelter system improved for many because hotels are being used.
One of the reasons that people in abusive situations are in more danger is because they have few places to go outside the home with everything closed down. Children especially who are trapped in abusive homes when school was closed couldn't tell a teacher, coach, minister, or friend what was happening. Many child abuse experts said that teachers are well trained to spot signs and are concerned that with children away from school that this is a pair of eyes not looking out for them.
Pondering wrote:
No where in Canada has had a lockdown.
My church has not been able to have an indoor service since mid-March. I am not able to volunteer at any social service organizations that I usually do. Services for vulnerable people in urban Winnipeg are disrupted. Practicums for student programs here are also disrupted. Don't tell me that we are not under lockdown here in Winnipeg because I know exactly what has happened here.
Pondering wrote:
Aristotleded24 wrote:
Lockdowns are an illusion of safety to the priviledged middle-aged and retired crowd who has the option to stay home without worrying about their income.
I am safer staying home
So stay home then. You have that priviledge. It doesn't give you the right to try and control someone else's behaviour or movements.
Pondering wrote:
Aristotleded24 wrote:
Everyone else is thrown under the bus because these people are scared.
The only people being "thrown under the bus" are people being forced to work in non-essential jobs.
IOW, I'm safe in my home and okay paying lip service to the "essential workers" who don't have that option.
Pondering wrote:
The most vulnerable in society are always the ones to suffer the most be it a fire, hurricane, tital wave or pandemic. That doesn't mean it is wrong for people who can to save themselves to do so. We are not morally required to sacrifice our lives for the lives of others.
Hold on a second. You have for months defended the idea that it is a moral imperative that everyone restrict their movements to help the medical staff who are overwhelmed, giving up weddings, education, family visits, important cultral celebrations, and all kinds of things. Now you are saying we don't have an obligation to make sacrifices for others. Which is it?
From what I have heard and read, the medical community in Winnipeg is upset with the new code red restrictions because they do not go far enough. One of the biggest exemptions they are bringing up is how lax they are being with religious gatherings that have been the primary source of infection for many First Nations communities in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. One thing is clear, Manitoba is doing a crappy job in explaining or justifying what they choose to close, partially close or leave open. People are perpetually confused. This includes the restrictions for gatherings at home which seemingly allow a maximum of 5 people in addition to those resident in the homes (it was 10 while we were in code orange). That seems like a recipe for disaster (which it proved to be thanks to Thanksgiving celebrations).
Full lockdown would mean nobody who lives outside your home is allowed in and that is what we dealt with back in April. When things eased up, many of us just limited social gatherings to outdoor spaces in small diads or triads in outdoor spaces (parks, backyard, private patio). As things further eased, some cautious people identified their own extended bubble of many one to three people that they might invite indoors but still using social distancing and hand sanitizers and other precautions.
And of course, considerations need to be made for vulnerable people who do not have homes or family to be with. The Main Street Project and One Just City (along with other missions) are doing their best to ensure their safety and wellbeing. In fact, those organizations have been given funding to ramp up their facilities and services.
Does the situation suck for many, many people. Absolutely. It is not great on anyone's mental wellbeing to be denied social time with family and friends (especially hard when travel is involved). It is also hard on earnings for many people inspite of emergency relief measures put in place. I am working at 50% and maybe even less with this new surge and my partner who managed to keep working full time will probably be down to 25% in hours given the code red status. It is by no means a walk in the park for anyone - some more than others. WE KNOW THIS.
Those are not facilities the homeless get to hang out in no matter how cold outside. In Montreal a hotel is being opened up to use as a rooming house until March 31st. Shelter capacity is being increased and warming centres are being opened.
You have a preexisting preference for which you go hunting to find reasons to support. Your focus is not the homeless it is on keeping facilities opened. Next you will say people need these places for their mental health or something else again ignoring the fact that we are short on PPEs and staff.
If the best you can do is to insult my intelligence that is pretty sad.
When those medical experts have spent long days outside in winter day after day or are making less than the equivalent of $15/hour and can speak to that reality from first-hand experience, I will maybe consider their view that lockdown should go into effect.
Besides, the opinions of the "medical community" are very complex. It's only the medical experts who support lockdown that are receiving attention because that reinforces the media narrative. You're not hearing from medical experts who question unless you search things out yourself and you do your own research.
So far I am aware of one full-blown outbreak and a few known exposures. Besides, everybody knows there is a risk to coronavirus, and these gatherings can be a place where they can find emotional, social, and community support. What right does anybody have to tell them where they can and cannot gather?
What consenting adults do in their own homes and who they allow in are nobody's business, pandemic or no, and I really don't want to see expansion of any police or surveillance infrastructure go towards this enforcement, especially since we know it will be retained and then redirected against left-wing activits once the pandemic is over. Besides, I don't really trust the claim that private house gathering spread covid any more than they would spread any other infectious disease. So far that claim has been made by politicians and government ministers who constantly lie to the public, and media organizations that have a great deal to gain by making everyone scared of covid. It's the same story we heard all the time: Easter/Mother's Day/Victoria Day/Canada Day/August Long/Labour Day/Thanksgiving, almost on cue timed just to strike fear into people's hearts. Has anybody offered up any actual evidence that this is the case?
I live a few blocks away from an urban drop-in centre downtown. When the pandemic hit, they had to close their doors inside and all they could do was have people line up, grab their lunches, and go on their way. Had health officials consulted with them, I'm sure they would have said, "this drop-in provides a vital service to these people, and we believe that the threats to their physical and mental health from not having this space open far outweigh the risk of the coronavirus."
And that can very easily trigger health problems that are more severe and long-lasting than what the pandemic would have been. If a lockdown saves a person's life from covid, only to trigger poor habits that compromise that person's health and those habits result in a premature death down the road, I don't see how that can be defended from a public health perspective.
Maybe I would be more open to lockdowns if I believed they did some good, but I honestly believe that for the most part, the virus does what it wants to and lockdowns only give people the illusion of control over the pandemic. Even here in Manitoba, cases continued to go up even after it was mandatory for everybody to wear masks in any indoor spaces for a month. New case numbers are down in Manitoba sharply from where they were a few days ago, which cannot be explained by the lockdown measures. The new infection curve looks like it's at the crest in Ontario and (while bouncing around somewhat on each day) in Quebec. Saskatchewan is doing very well compared to us (have they ever had a new daily case count in the triple digits?), and I think a big factor is a higher level of population immunity from their multiple outbreaks in the spring. Furthermore, case numbers are a bit misleading. I was talking to someone the other day who had to isolate after testing positive for covid even without showing symptoms. Positive cases can range anywhere from asymptomatic to a miserable cough and sore throat to flat-tired on one's back to in an ICU. Is there any actual public health reason to publish case numbers, especially since it depends in large part on the amount of testing?
I can deal with stress and depression being in my life for the next 5-10 years over being hospitalized in ICU and mabye never leaving in the immediate future. It's as simple as that in my view. Acute disease treatment always trumps chronic disease treatment - or at least it should. The whole practice of triage in based on that assumption.
Manitoba First Nations communities bearing the brunt of the covid pandemic
To know that almost half of cases admitted to the ICU are Aboriginal blows my mind.
I'm pretty sure you are wrong about that. I haven't heard of any complaining of being shut down. They want to protect their workers and clients from Covid too. We are expanding services (not enough) but hotels are being transformed into shelters, warming centres are planned etc.
I was just in touch with "1 Just City" and they are still operating and providing services, even if limited by COVID-19 safety precautions. Here is a link that describes what they are doing during the pandemic:
https://www.1justcity.ca/covid-19-response
I'm pretty sure since I live in the area and know people connected to this drop-in that I know what I'm talking about.
Then why didn't you just say that the management running the place was against the closure?
Small businesses cry foul:
So it looks like the big players have an unfair advantage here. Couldn't you argue that from a containment perspective, it's better to have many small businesses open? That way there are smaller clusters of people spread out throughtout many stores, rather than forcing a larger number into the few larger stores that are open.
Hypocrisy of Democratic officials celebrating Biden's win while cancelling Thanksgiving exposed.
The hypocrisy of these people is quite galling. First there was this insistence that it was a moral obligation to stay home unless absolutely necessary. Then the lockdown protests began. When protesters spoke to the negative societal and health impacts of the lockdown, they were dismissed out of hand, pathologized, and made to be evil people who don't care about the spread of the coronavirus. Then BLM took to the street, and since the left agrees with BLM, suddenly it's okay to gather in large groups. Then Trump rallies began to happen, and suddenly it was not okay to attend those, even though those in attendance would have known and accepted the risk they were taking. The left even accepted arguments about racism killing more people than covid after dismissing a similar line of arguments from the lockdown protest. Now there are ridiculous rules and regulations coming out about Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings, but celebrating Biden's win is now okay? If it is a moral obligation that people have to stay home to stop the coronavirus, then that has to apply across the board. You can't ask people to give up things that are meaningful to them, like family gatherings or singing in church, and then suddenly say the rules don't apply when it's something you agree with.
I don't even think they truly understand the damage they are doing to public health guidance. Yes, the Republicans have undertaken a crusade against science and reason. Yes, there are times when experts and scientists have to stand up and say, "despite what public perception says, here are the facts." Unfortunately educated professionals too often come across as if to say, "I'm educated and you lesser people should listen to me and respect my knowledge." That not only turns people off, but plays right into the hands of Republicans. Also, if you take a look at this graph, you will see a strong relationship between how people vote and their likelihood of following health guidance. If that relationship is strong, that puts everyone in more danger, because threats to public health do not care how you vote. What's coming even clearer is that we are being subjected to emotional blackmail, gaslighting, and psychological terrorism that is masquerading as public health guidance, and more people are catching onto that. The danger here is that it damages people's trust in public health guidance to the point that they will simply refuse to follow it.
Minority businesses particularly hard hit:
British scientists: lockdowns are a luxury only the affluent can afford
Sweden abandons its coronavirus model
Sweden has banned gatherings of more than 8 people as a second wave of coronavirus continues to grow. "Don't go to gyms, don't go to libraries, don't host dinners. Cancel," Swedish Prime Minister Lofven said.
The Atlantic bubble is also no more and partial lockdowns are being introduced (25% capacity on retail, closure of gyms, museums, casinos, libraries, bars, etc - only food take out or delivery for restaurants, etc).
As any infectious disease expert could have predicted, once we came out of lockdown, the virus was going to come back. That was especially true of a respiratory virus when it spreads in the winter time. Of the handful of countries that the suppressionist crowd claims as success, Taiwan is the only one of those countries that did not see a recurrence. I wonder why this group looks at that and claims that lockdowns need to be harder, tighter, and stricter, and never seems to question that if only a few countries managed to control the virus, maybe something about the virus is beyond human control.
For the most part, this current wave looks like it's on its way out. We can probably expect a resurgence in the New Year. I'd also expect the virus to come back in the Fall. Do you *really* think even having the threat of shutdowns hanging over our heads any time this virus pops up is any viable or sustainable way to run society in the long term?
Thank God CERB has worked so perfectly without any glitches:
When CERB expires, and peolpe without jobs are forced to pay it back, things are not going to be pretty. Make no mistake, the federal government's economic response was a disaster. CERB just covers that up for the time being and kicks that can down the road.
I guess that is because it wasn't actually a lock down. When Wuhan came out of its lock down the virus did not come back because it only lives for so long and if everyone stays at home it doesn't spread and disappears from the population.
There are some indications that the curve was going to peak on its own independent of the impact the lockdown had. Even so, lockdowns impose other costs, such as disabled children having starved to death as suggested by Edward Snowden. That's the problem with covid zealotry is that people are too focused on covid and they simply ignore or dismiss the costs of the measures taken into effect to fight it. When these drastic measures to stop covid lead to such things as increasing overdose deaths or hundreds of millions of people possibly starving to death in the developing world (compared to just over 60 million covid cases today, and a "case" could mean someone tested positive but never felt sick and had no reason to suspect anything was wrong independent of the test) then these measures have to be considered a public health failure.
Really A2, "hundreds of millions of people possibly starving to death in the developing world."
Actually yes:
Many US states have no restrictions and I am sure it has made no difference in the number of deaths due to hunger in the global south. Anyway, it seems that if COVID-19 doesn't kill you if you're a resident in a long-term care facility, malnourishment and dehydration certainly will. That is something we can take some control over and demand change from our provincial and federal governments.
If migrant workers in industrialized countries were thrown out of work, that may affect remittances they can send home. Disruption of trade routes can also impact economies. It could also be the case that lockdowns in developing countries pushed people into poverty, and that these lockdowns would have had far worse impact than even the worst unmitigated covid spread.
So for people who accuse me of advocating a liberterian approach to the pandemic, I will try to spell out this examlpe one more time:
I still go into my workplace, and I go out to the store myself for groceries. I could, if I wanted to, insist on working from home. I could also have my groceries delivered to me, thereby eliminating a need to ever leave my residence. That would essentially put me in compliance with the letter and the spirit of the public health orders. Meanwhile, someone else has to work in the grocery store and take the risk of covid exposure. The person delivering my groceries also has to take on the occupational hazard of driving in order to get them to me. So while I am completely safe, all the risks are being borne by someone other than me. The virus will still spread in the world around me, it just won't affect me because I'm not in direct contact with anyone. How is that behaviour in any way consistent with a communitarian response?
The impact of lockdowns on the working class in Toronto:
But lockdowns are supposed to stop the spread of the virus. These authors are alleging it has had the opposite impact in working class neighbourhoods. Do they explain why?
The emphasis in the above paragraphs is mine.
To reitierate something I said earlier: Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown even said that the lockdown will have no impact on covid spread in the city he leads precisely because a large part of that workforce are "essential workers" who have to go to work to keep the rest of us fed.
We must protect the elderly:
There are more stories in that article about families feeling pressured into acceping DNR orders.
Here is another question I have for the "everybody-should-work-from-home" crowd. My own workplace has changed its training to train people from home electronically. In other words, to apply to work there, you need some sort of electronic device with an internet connection in order to apply. A former co-worker from that place who was there many years ago simply did not have access to his own computer. Even if libraries or internet cafes were open right now, that would be a problem because of privacy issues. You would need your own private place to train. So assuming other workplaces went to this model, this former co-worker and many others in his position would find fewer places to apply to work. How should this problem be addressed?
Buy a computer or the business should supply one like my kids school and my office did for those that needed it
well, that's the surficial layer. but the folks who build the computers, toil for amazon, mine the metals, and connect the computer don't have the option to "work from home".
but hey, they're off-white, poor and unseen.
it's yet another example of corporate product "solutions" to bio-social problems, as wealth flow upwards to the elites accelerates, and more and more of our lives are driven online to be tracked and manipulated.
don't get me wrong, working from home is part of the toolkit. it's also a lot of other things.
1) How is someone who doesn't have a job supposed to get the computer, espeically if they are struggling to put food on the table?
2) You think businesses that are out to make money are going to go to the expense to provide computers for their employees, especially if enough of the population has their own computers to choose from that the businesses don't have to worry about people who don't?
You mentioned mining the metals. Wouldn't that involve destruction of large amounts of the natural world in order to find those metals? Destruction of the natural world that will throw ecosystems into such a state of unbalance as to risk releasing more new-to-us viruses into the human population? Viruses to which (unlike the coronavirus) we have never encountered and to which nobody is immune?
I have been saying since day one of this pandemic that the man camps in the fracking fields need to be shut down. Here is a report with the latest evidence and the cries for more restrictions from the people in the North, especially the indigenous communities.
1-How are they supposed to get office clothes or travel to a job without some fund? You can get a cheap laptop for $250 and basic internet cheaply or use your phone as a hotspot
2-Yup
A2, you bring up problems as though lifting the lockdown and overloading hospitals so more people die in Canada is a solution.
The solution on this board if I am reading the consensus properly is minimum basic income.
In Canada the only person that can sign a DNR is the patient not some nurse. I am more concerned about allowing mental health issues as acceptable reasons for assisted suicide. That is not needed in order to allow advance directives for people with fatal degenerative diseases such as ALS.
Concerning the plight of impoverished countries. The solution is to stop making war on them through unfair trade deals not Canadians dying for them.
We all agree that there are negative outcomes on the neediest people in Canada and the world. That is always the case. Overloading hospitals would not help them. If everything opened up eventually too many people would be sick to keep everything open. Covid-19 doesn't respond to political arguments. There is not a single place in the entire world that has been able to remain fully open without first taking drastic measures to prevent it from arriving in the community/province/state/country.
Wow that is ignorant. This former co-worker of mine would have struggled to even come up with an extra $250 for the computer, and I'm not sure this former co-worker ever had the internet at home or ever had a cell phone. Iit reminds me of the right-wing trope that people living in poverty don't need higher minimum wages or more generous social support levels, they just need to stop wasting money on alcohol and cigarettes and they would have all the money they need. Not to mention that a laptop that cheap might have performance issues that could interfere with doing the job. Do you think the company would be sympathetic to that? But not to worry, because even if those kinds of jobs are unavailable, this person could work as a delivery driver taking restaurant meals to the stay-at-home crowd. This person is not only taking the risk of exposure to covid, but is also taking on the additional occoupational hazard that comes with driving.
For people who have the priviledge and the luxury to stay home throughout this pandemic (and both of those things are a priviledge and a luxury) why is that not enough? Why this need to control other's behaviour to the point of disallowing them from going to a gym, library, church, to sing in front of an audience, or even to visit other people in their private family resdences? Yet somehow, to the stay-at-home crowd, it's comlpetely acceptable for someone else to expose themselves to covid and take on the occupational hazards of delivering items to them because the stay-at-home crowd is too afraid to leave the house? That hypocrisy sickens me, and the stay-at-home crowd has the gall to claim that people who want to live their lives as we did pre-pandemic are the selfish ones?
The data simply do not support this make-believe scenario you are advocating. For one, if you compare infection curves from many different countries, you cannot tell from looking at these cruves when social distancing, lockdowns, and mask mandates went into effect. If you compare areas that did lock down with areas that didn't, you still can't pick them out based on the curves. Furthermore, I have consistently pointed to data suggesting that hosptializations in Ontario, while up, are nowhere near where they were in the spring. Lastly, if it's a question of whether more people will die, there are convincing arguments that the lockdown measures will be responsible for more direct and indirect deaths than would have happened from covid. Finally, there is also evidence that in spite of the attention, that ICUs in the United Kingdom are not higher than one would expect for this time of year.
Belarus never locked down in any major way, and even in spite of a large increase in cases right now, has never recorded more than 10 deaths per day. Many of the Eastern European countries (with the obvious exceptions of Poland and Hungary) have also had more relaxed measures than their Western European counterparts.
He could not, in that case, take a job delivering meals or groceries since both those jobs require a cellphone.
So he gets to be unemployed then. Really progressive, and so disgusting that this is the reality that the "stay-at-home" crowd has encouraged without any regard for people thrown under the bus when they are safe at home.
This proves my point that the "work-from-home" trend will leave people behind, and there is no concern about that at all.
There will never be a one size fits all in this respect. I am able to work from hom, my wife cannot and never the twain will meet
Again, we need look no farther than our own borders. We don't need a shred of evidence from the rest of the world. We have 9 months of experience therefore our own numbers.
We know what our hospital capacity is. We know how long the delay is between diagnosis and hospital admissions and deaths. It is a three to four week lead time. That is enough for health care professionals to predict when they will run out of beds and staff. They tell the government in X weeks we will have to turn away patients. Health care professionals have nothing to gain from shutdowns. They aren't bucking for more money. They are quitting. Statistics showing health care professionals are at greater risk than the general population are not fake.
During the first wave surgeries had to be cancelled. Cancer treatments had to be cancelled. Hip surgeries had to be cancelled.
Explain to me why you think our health care professionals at every level, from nurses right up to hospital administrations are warning the government they can't handle the flow of patients.
Health care workers, like delivery workers and grocery workers etc. don't get to stay home. Explain to me why you think it is fine to force medical personnel to quit or risk their lives on behalf of others when it is unnecessary?
That some workers can't work from home or have essential jobs is reality. That one person must take risks does not mean the fair thing to do is to make everyone else also take risks. If the risk could be split that would make sense but making office workers keep working outside the home would not reduce the risk for essential workers. It would increase the risk to essential workers by forcing them to mingle with more people. Keeping grocery stores free of crowding isn't just for the benefit of shoppers. It benefits the workers that have to be there as well.
No one here thinks it is okay that drug addicts and people with mental health issues are suffering even more because of the restrictions but Covid didn't create these problems it only made them more visible and more acute. We definitely should be doing more. Risking the lives of everyone else would not solve the problem it would make it worse. Even more addicts and mentally ill people would be dying as they are always last in line. It would be no different when beds and respirators are being rationed.
No one here thinks it is acceptable for drug addicts to die at any time regardless of Covid. The response to covid didn't create the crisis. Addicts didn't just start dying recently. I think everyone on this board supports full access to medical grade drugs for addicts. We all see it as a medical problem not a law enforcement issue.
Belaris is an excellent example. We should have more beds per capita. It is not something we can have tomorrow. It takes years to train medical professionals and build hospitals. I have been saying for months that it is outrageous that we don't have widespread testing by now so we could limit restrictions. It is outrageous that we don't have enough PPEs even now. It is outrageous that corporations are benefiting from Covid while people suffer. I could list a lot more outrages.
What is not an outrage is restrictions aimed at slowing the spread enough to prevent our health care systems from collapsing. That would be catastrophic. It already has been catastrophic in nursing homes which did collapse under the pressure leaving people to die of dehydration and starvation due to lack of staff. Did you volunteer to do that kind of work because I didn't. I'm not willing to work in a care home or hospital. The least we can do for people who are doing that work is to stay out of their way by remaining at home.
And that's the problem with lockdowns is they are a one-size-fits-all solution imposed on the general population.
They haven't provided acutal data to back up their claims espeically relative to other years. In some places where people have actually asked that question, we see that the load on hospitals is not unexpected for this time of year.
Why do you think it's fine to force people into unsafe situations like domestic abuse and drug overdoses when it's not necessary?
The restrictions are not working. Here in Manitoba, we have been under tight restrictions for over a month, and it was during this last period when covid had its biggest impacts on care homes and hospitals, the very places you do not want an infection to spread. Patrick Brown, the Mayor of Brampton, said the lockdown on his city was not going to make a difference in spread because so many of his workforce were essential workers. Lockdowns are an illusion of safety to the priviledged middle-aged and retired crowd who has the option to stay home without worrying about their income. Everyone else is thrown under the bus because these people are scared.
And I'll say it again, if a surge in covid patients is going to collapse the health care system, that collapse is inevitable regardless. Not only will surgeries and procedures back up and increase (unless some of these people die while waiting, but hey, that is an acceptable sacrifice to the "I'm-scared-of-covid" crowd) but there will be more people needing these procedures. You also have to consider additional strain on the system from the despair brought on by the measures, to increased drug overdoses, increased acloholism, to even outright violence and open social unrest breaking loose on the streets. I can tell you from what I've seen in Winnipeg that that last item is a very realistic possibility.
And it turns out there truly is no such thing as a free lunch:
The bill is coming due. All that money to tank our economy, run up the deficit, and what do we have to show for it? Just using that cash to protect elder care homes would have had much better results.
The workers can fend for themselves, right? Giving out money to people who were unemployed was a bad idea?
In Quebec we have had numbers of nurses quitting. We have had to call in the army. I trust nurses (collectively) more than I do any other profession. I do not believe that either they or doctors are lying about conditions in hospitals.
We don't. Adults make choices. We are not permitted to force them to leave abusive situations or force them into treatment programs. We should still reach out to try to save them but it is not the same as demanding health care workers risk their lives or lose their jobs. In Quebec the shelter system improved for many because hotels are being used.
That is for Manitoba to figure out. I have said all along, look to your local situation. We can get general information from all around the world but not two places have the exact same situation. It doesn't apply in Quebec and restrictions in Canada are provincial and municipal not Federal. No where in Canada has had a lockdown. If your doctors and nurses can manage then more power to them. I fully supported the Atlantic bubble. I fully support BC's measures. Ontario and Quebec not so much.
Concerning numbers going up after restrictions have been applied it makes perfect sense. Hospital admissions are delayed 3 to 4 weeks after people catch it. When testing indicates more people are getting sick than the hospital can manage a month later that is when the restrictions come into place. The numbers keep going up for weeks after that. Even so I am 100% in favor of Manitoba doing what it sees fits their situation best.
It isn't an illusion. I am safer staying home, and there have been no lockdowns in Canada. Wuhan locked down. We haven't even had a curfew.
The only people being "thrown under the bus" are people being forced to work in non-essential jobs. I can stay home no matter what anyone does. So can all the people who have the option of working from home. Are you suggesting they should be forced to go to offices?
That just isn't true. Hospitals have rooms for X number of patients. The system is calibrated to have a percentage of stretch for emergencies like a major multi-vehicle crash or a big fire or a gas explosion. When these things occur off-duty people, even some not on call, rally until the emergency is over. It is not built to be in a perpetual state of emergency.
You are making no sense. The reason we flatten the curve is so these other life-saving treatments can go forward. If Covid overwhelms the system then they have to start cancelling anything that isn't immediately life-threatening.
I do. Nothing happens in a vacumn. The vast majority of businesses in Quebec are open for business. The majority of restrictions apply to social-distancing and mask-wearing. The most onerous restrictions in Quebec apply to private gatherings and hospitality businesses.
The most vulnerable in society are always the ones to suffer the most be it a fire, hurricane, tital wave or pandemic. That doesn't mean it is wrong for people who can to save themselves to do so. We are not morally required to sacrifice our lives for the lives of others.
Best thing I can do for medical professionals is to stay out of the way. Best thing I can do for those who are stricken with Covid is to stay out of the way. The best thing I can do for people who are forced to work is stay out of their way.
I agree. When it comes to pandemics primarily I trust immunologists, nurses, doctors, scientists, and other medical and health care professionals. Nurses and doctors are making very significant sacrifices, sometimes even with their lives.
That's not what I said. If you look to my link, you will note that the workers will have to pay that money back. Once the government decides to end the CERB, people who don't have jobs to go back to because the businesses failed won't have any government support to rely on. That will especially be the case if the next federal election produces a majority government, which will all too happily use the deficit as an excuse to effectively do away with what remains of our social support programs.
One of the reasons that people in abusive situations are in more danger is because they have few places to go outside the home with everything closed down. Children especially who are trapped in abusive homes when school was closed couldn't tell a teacher, coach, minister, or friend what was happening. Many child abuse experts said that teachers are well trained to spot signs and are concerned that with children away from school that this is a pair of eyes not looking out for them.
My church has not been able to have an indoor service since mid-March. I am not able to volunteer at any social service organizations that I usually do. Services for vulnerable people in urban Winnipeg are disrupted. Practicums for student programs here are also disrupted. Don't tell me that we are not under lockdown here in Winnipeg because I know exactly what has happened here.
So stay home then. You have that priviledge. It doesn't give you the right to try and control someone else's behaviour or movements.
IOW, I'm safe in my home and okay paying lip service to the "essential workers" who don't have that option.
Hold on a second. You have for months defended the idea that it is a moral imperative that everyone restrict their movements to help the medical staff who are overwhelmed, giving up weddings, education, family visits, important cultral celebrations, and all kinds of things. Now you are saying we don't have an obligation to make sacrifices for others. Which is it?
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