Canada plans to ease Covid-19 lockdown restrictions

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Even as Canada has crossed 50,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19 infection, the Government has released new guidelines for gradual easing of restrictions across the country.

The Government also published new projections for the toll the pandemic is having. The new short-term modelling forecasts that by May 5, the country will record between 53,191 and 66,835 cases and between 3,277 and 3,883 deaths.

Those numbers on Tuesday night were at 50,015 and 2,859, respectively. At the same time, public health authorities pointed out to a pattern of slowing of coronavirus-related caseload, with the doubling rate now at 16 days against three days earlier.

However, officials warned that the country could be beset by a second wave of infections if people were careless about safety precautions like social distancing going ahead. During his daily media briefing, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said, “The measures we have taken so far are working. In fact, in many parts of the country, the curve has flattened. But we are not out of the woods yet.”

The Federal Government has worked out guidelines with provincial and territorial administrations about the path ahead. According to a statement from the PMO, they “agreed to a set of common principles for restarting the Canadian economy, based on shared understanding and appreciation of what science and experts are telling us.” It also acknowledged the importance of restarting the economy through “a gradual approach that protects the health of Canadians” while ensuring “public health capacity for future waves of the virus.”

Different jurisdictions will take different routes and time frames for this process, “in order to ease restrictions, reflecting the specific circumstances” of each province or territory. “Our priority is keeping all Canadians safe, while getting back to normal as much as we can,” Trudeau noted. Among the main principles for the criteria and measures required before easing is undertaken is that “Covid-19 transmission is controlled, so new cases are contained at a level that our health care system can manage.”