(Montreal) The federal government will respond to Quebec’s requests for help with COVID-19 vaccination, Civil Protection Minister Bill Blair announced on Twitter on Tuesday.
A week earlier, the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Public Security of Quebec, Geneviève Guilbault, had asked the Canadian government to deploy the Canadian Armed Forces, as well as other organizations, to “contribute to mass vaccination” .
“Omicron threatens the hospital capacity of Quebec. We must speed up the vaccination of Quebecers, ”she explained on Twitter.
Via the same medium, Minister Blair said on Tuesday that “we have approved this request for federal assistance.”
“Our officials are discussing with their (provincial) counterparts to clarify specific needs, and we will share more details soon,” he added.
Before that, the Canadian soldiers had been deployed during the first wave of the pandemic, at the beginning of 2020, to provide assistance in the CHSLDs, which were then the most affected.
Quebec Health Minister Christian Dubé said on Tuesday that around 7,000 healthcare workers had had to be absent because of COVID-19, a number he said will rise in the coming days.
He also announced that the third dose of the vaccine will be made available to the general public during the month of January, gradually, one age group at a time.
Quebec once again surpassed its record, with a tally of 12,833 new cases reported on Tuesday. There are 702 ongoing hospitalizations, including 115 in intensive care. In addition, 15 deaths were added to the total.
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