Who says election campaign says large gatherings, handshakes, hugs. Without health measures, and at a time when COVID-19 seems to be on the rise again, specialists are calling on candidates and party leaders to “use caution” on the ground, particularly with the oldest and most vulnerable.
Posted at 5:00 a.m.
“They should all be more careful, overall, especially around people who are more at risk. We understand that it is difficult for someone who is campaigning to wear a mask, but it is a matter of respect. There is not a candidate who wants to end up generating an outbreak that could cause death and hospitalizations,” says Dr.r David Lussier, from the University Institute of Geriatrics of Montreal.
At the end of July, even before the start of the campaign, the Dr Lussier had launched a strong call for vigilance, while several elected officials had been seen rubbing shoulders with elderly people without masks. All the parties had then undertaken to enforce the instructions as much as possible. Since then, however, discrepancies have been noted. Very recently, on Monday, the caquist candidate Bernard Drainville also removed a photo from social networks, where we saw him without a face covering with a 96-year-old woman.
Several indicators currently point to a resumption of the spread of COVID-19 in Quebec. The province reported 902 new cases on Tuesday. These bring the daily average to 765. The trend is thus up 11% over one week. The share of PCR screening tests proving positive for COVID-19 remains high, at 8.6%. The number of workers absent due to the pandemic has also increased over the past week. They were 3,470 on Tuesday to have to isolate themselves, or 9% more than seven days ago.
“A real threat”
At the School of Public Health of the University of Montreal (ESPUM), Professor Roxane Borgès Da Silva warns “that starting next week, with the arrival of colder weather, we can think that the transmission of COVID-19 is likely to redouble, or at least increase”.
“We’re all fed up. But exhaustion or not, it’s a real threat, so you absolutely have to develop resilience to deal with it, and avoid a catastrophe. All people in the countryside must apply the precautionary principle to the maximum”, she maintains in the same breath.
For the Dr André Veillette, researcher at the Montreal Clinical Research Institute (IRCM), it is obvious that an eighth wave of contamination must be considered. “With the cold coming, yes, but also the meetings which are increasing, the services which are resuming, the drop at the same time in vaccine protection, we must expect it in the middle of the electoral campaign”, he evokes.
Campaign or no campaign, I think we should all follow the same metrics. If there are suddenly a lot of cases, we wear the mask, we meet in well-ventilated places, we practice distancing, and we have people do rapid tests if necessary.
André Veillette, researcher at the IRCM
He says he regrets that politicians “do not set a good example often enough”. “We will have to be ready to react if the cases start to rise again”, he also insists, calling on the parties to provide specific protocols in this direction.
“COVID still exists”
In the caravans, the parties claim to be aware of the health context in which they are campaigning. “COVID still exists. We continue to test each other regularly, my whole team and me. We are continuing to take the measures that we had put in place at the start of the campaign, ”said solidarity worker Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois on Tuesday. His party assures that it will adapt if the epidemiological situation changes.
“We think we are doing enough. It is up to Public Health to tell us if there are other things that we need to change, but we will respect the rules, ”assured the Liberal leader, Dominique Anglade, on Tuesday, saying to try as much as possible “to do outdoor activities. “As soon as I go up [dans l’autocar], I wash my hands for several seconds to make sure we avoid contamination. When we go to places that are closed with people who are in residence, we wear the mask, ”she insisted.
Recalling that we must always remain cautious, François Legault, he said he found “reassuring to see cases and hospitalizations drop” for a few weeks. He also assured that everyone was tested against COVID-19 in the event of symptoms; this was the case on Tuesday for Minister Chantal Rouleau, who coughed frequently during the outgoing Prime Minister’s press briefing.
“There is a democratic exercise that must be done once every four years, and we cannot remove that space in the name of the existence of the virus, because that virus is here for a long time. […]. We are careful to the extent of what is indicated, ”offered PQ player Paul St-Pierre Plamondon.
Conservative leader Éric Duhaime said that the management of a new wave of COVID-19 would be like the one we experienced last summer. No measures would be imposed. “For us, coercive measures have not proven themselves,” he said.
With the collaboration of Tommy Chouinard, Charles Lecavalier, Fanny Lévesque, Hugo Pilon-Larose and Mylène Crête, The Press