Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott can’t say when regions, like northern Ontario, will be able to move to Stage 3 of reopening.
However, Finance Minister Rod Phillips says they have been following a 2 to 4 week monitoring period as the framework to move towards a transition to easing restrictions.
The north entered Stage 2 on June 12th.
Phillips says “Our priority in Stage 3 is to get businesses open. Not just open but open in a way where customers will be able to enjoy both a safe experience but also those businesses will be able to be viable. So we will closely monitor that.”
Elliott says a Jobs and Recovery committee will look at who will be able to reopen next, but warns health officials still have to assess the health affects of people from Stage 2.
“Understanding if there’s any concern areas that we need to be dealing with. Whether we need to slow down a little bit. Whether we need to maybe remove one or two few things from Stage 2. So we haven’t done that analysis yet because it hasn’t been long enough.”
Elliott stresses moving forward depends on a number of factors.
“Including the number of new cases. The ability to manage things from a health perspective, hospital occupancy and so on. As well as the public health resources in each area to make sure that their able to deal with any potential uptakes in cases.”
Elliott notes the government has been going by the same framework that they have been following since the end of April.
By the end of the week all but one region in the province will be at Stage 2.
