Restaurants and non-essential businesses will be welcoming back customers on Tuesday.
Ontario officials have announced our region will be at the Orange-Restrict level when the provincial stay-at-home order is lifted.
That means screening will be required when going to stores and private organized events, like in your backyard or at the park, will be limited to ten people inside and twenty-five people outside.
Organized events at staffed business facilities are set at 50 people inside and 100 people outside.
Restaurants and bars must have two metres between tables, with the maximum amount of people allowed inside at 50 and only four people are allowed at a table.
Gyms will also be allowed to open but they are limited to fifty people and there must be three metres between exercise areas.
Visitor restrictions will be in place at long-term care homes in public health regions that are in the Orange-Restrict level or higher.
Only one caregiver is allowed to visit a resident at one time with some examples of caregivers being family members or friends, privately hired caregivers or paid companions.
General visitors aren’t allowed to visit.
Caregivers must also show that they have received a negative COVID-19 test in the past week and verbally attest to not having tested positive since then.
They can also show a negative antigen test result from the day of the visit.
“The restrictions that were in place over the past month have been difficult for everyone, but they were necessary to bring case numbers down. Together, Huron-Perth residents have done a great job,” says Dr. Miriam Klassen, Medical Officer of Health for Huron Perth Public Health. “I’m pleased that residents will have more social and economic opportunities, which are needed for health and wellbeing. However, I caution that the end of the stay-at-home order is not a reopening or a return to normal. The COVID-19 situation is still serious, especially with the risk of new variants. I strongly advise everyone to continue following public health measures: stay at home, avoid social gatherings, only travel between regions for essential purposes, and limit close contacts to your household or those you live with. If cases increase again, it may be necessary to apply an ‘emergency brake’ – moving our region back into Grey-Lockdown.”
The province has introduced an “emergency brake” for the reopening of all areas of the province.
That brake will be pulled if the number of new COVID-19 cases starts to spike in any region, especially where a variant may be spreading.
The emergency brake will move an area from any level of the province’s framework into the Grey-Lockdown level to control the spread of the virus.
On Monday, Health Minister Christine Elliott said this is not a reopening or a return to normal, but rather an acknowledgment that steady progress is being made to flatten the curve of cases in Ontario.
On Thursday, Dr. Adalsteinn Brown of Ontario’s COVID-19 Advisory Table says cases and hospitalizations are going down, but a third wave and lockdown are a very serious threat right now because of the spread of the variants.
New modelling data shows the increased spread of the variant will likely result in another surge of cases in late February.
