Quebec government won't close daycares again during potential second wave
The Quebec government says it won’t close down its daycares during a second wave of COVID-19.
Quebec’s Health Minister, Christian Dubé, made the announcement from the capital on Thursday, stating daycares across the province would stay open because the measures that have been put in place to prevent the spread of the disease has worked among children.
Dubé says there’s sound evidence that COVID-19 doesn’t spread easily with children.
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The health minister said a daycare will only be shut down if there’s an outbreak within the facility.
Dubé said there have been only 123 recorded cases in daycares across the province since mid-March, 57 of which were among children.
“Even in Montreal, where there was a situation that was maybe worse than anywhere else in Quebec, we didn’t have a lot of cases,” said Families Minister Mathieu Lacombe. He says daycares are a “less important vector of transmission” of the virus and thinks the risk of keeping them open throughout the province is “very low.”
Heureux d’avoir présenté le plan pour les services de garde éducatifs à l’enfance en vue d’une éventuelle 2e vague avec mon collègue @lacombemathieu En cas d’une 2e vague, les services de garde seraient maintenus, une excellente nouvelle pour les parents! pic.twitter.com/4888dtC68J
— Christian Dubé (@cdube_sante) August 27, 2020
Dubé concluded that closing the daycare network would put too much of a strain on parents and would rather avoid the situation again in the event of a second wave.
The government announced a new online self-assessment tool that parents could use to monitor their child’s symptoms to determine whether or not they should stay home.
The government says the union and daycare workers are in agreement with the decision.
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