COVID-19 Manitoba

[cllew]

I heard last week that some Prov Govt Crown Corps were asking staff if they wanted to volunteer to be redeployed to Shared Health in the material distribution area. They would be assigned to working out of the central processing warehouse area or at some of the Winnipeg Hospitals dealing with PPE.

[Festivus]

Just a heads up for anyone who is not aware of this site: https://covid-19-status.ca/

It's by far the best at visualizing the data for the infection in Canada, and has charts for each province. It's interesting to see that five provinces have it "under control" (SK, MB, NB, PE, NL), and the other five do not. I put under control in quotes because there will certainly be a second wave as restrictions loosen. I assume it's not a coincidence that the five that are doing better are in the bottom six for population totals.

Here are charts for MB and SK, compared to ON and QC (worst-hit) (I apologize for the giant size, this forum really sucks at formatting since it's so old):

MB:


SK:


ON:


QC:

[Temperance]

Interesting stats. I think we got lucky with our relative geographic isolation. The MB response ramped up somewhat slowly (partly due to a global shortage in reagent and partly to the government being caught a bit flat footed by the magnitude of this). We had very limited testing, very slow test results (10-20 days for the first few weeks), and healthlinks was overwhelmed. But, the situation here seems pretty manageable at this point. We'll have to be vigilant not to allow outbreaks with eased social distancing and the eventual (not too soon I hope) reoopening of borders. All in all, some reason to be hopeful here.

[cheswick]

Re-opening plan for Manitoba to be revealed tomorrow. Testing opened up to all sympomatic people. Dr. Roussin not expecting to see a huge proportional increase in numbers due to the opening based on hospitalization numbers they've seen.

[rrskylar]

Buddy with a small business and a couple employees can open but won’t said he’s paid enough taxes over the years and he’ll gladly collect what the govt. gives him for a few more months, think his employees applied and are collecting EI now!

Just wonder how many other businesses are doing the same and how many students who will collect FREE money rather than looking for work, most of the time govt. programs are a disincentive to “do for ones self”!

[Festivus]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

Buddy with a small business and a couple employees can open but won’t said he’s paid enough taxes over the years and he’ll gladly collect what the govt. gives him for a few more months, think his employees applied and are collecting EI now!

Just wonder how many other businesses are doing the same and how many students who will collect FREE money rather than looking for work, most of the time govt. programs are a disincentive to “do for ones self”!

Depending on where one lives, if they want to avoid getting sick (or a loved one sick), then I can understand, especially considering that CERB (or EI) is going to be less than what they'd be making at a job.

[optimusREIM]

Originally Posted by Festivus

Depending on where one lives, if they want to avoid getting sick (or a loved one sick), then I can understand, especially considering that CERB (or EI) is going to be less than what they'd be making at a job.

As a musician and a student, I rely on gigs during the school year and summer employment to pay the bills. During an average summer of work and gigging I'd expect to make anywhere between 10 and 12k but the CERB only covers up to 8k so after I've accounted for expenses I won't have much left to pay tuition, which is rather pricey in my faculty. So already with CERB I'm at a loss, but imagine if I'm on the student emergency benefit, which pays 1250 a month. That basically covers my monthly expenses and not a whole lot more. I'd rather work and get on with it

[Festivus]

Originally Posted by optimusREIM

As a musician and a student, I rely on gigs during the school year and summer employment to pay the bills. During an average summer of work and gigging I'd expect to make anywhere between 10 and 12k but the CERB only covers up to 8k so after I've accounted for expenses I won't have much left to pay tuition, which is rather pricey in my faculty. So already with CERB I'm at a loss, but imagine if I'm on the student emergency benefit, which pays 1250 a month. That basically covers my monthly expenses and not a whole lot more. I'd rather work and get on with it

From what I have read, the myth of the person who wants to be on EI and not work is just that, a myth. There are of course always going to be some people who take advantage, but as far as I can tell, it's an incredibly low percentage. The whole idea that [I]too much[I] government support right now is a bad thing is kind of ridiculous. Heck, I feel guilty right now being paid my normal salary when my workload has dropped 50% (if I had to guess). Studies/surveys show that a desire to have meaning and purpose is an intrinsic quality of people, and feeling useless is something people want to avoid.

So if a few people take advantage in the current times and stay at home for their own safety, at the cost of being paid less, I certainly don't blame them. Compare the situation to the US where the federal and some state governments are looking to waive liability for companies that open back up and force their employees back to work, and are yanking unemployment/aid benefits for those who refuse to go back. It's designed to help corporations and their shareholders, not working people.

[dmacc]

So I made these graphs based on the data for Manitoba. It shows Manitoba's ability to manage patients in ICU with different levels of occupancy. I make an assumption to the non-COVID average occupancy based on what the restoring safe services report mentioned the occupancy was on April 22, 2020. This number may not be a true average but it is the best number I could find. The rest of the information was gathered from the daily bulletins the government releases and is accurate to May 2, 2020.

[dmacc]

Fail!, I can't seem to load the images from flickr. Sorry guys.

[Festivus]

Originally Posted by dmacc

Fail!, I can't seem to load the images from flickr. Sorry guys.

Imgur is probably the easiest place, just literally drag-and-drop onto the site, and then right-click once it's uploaded and select "copy image location," and paste that address here!

[dmacc]

Originally Posted by dmacc

So I made these graphs based on the data for Manitoba. It shows Manitoba's ability to manage patients in ICU with different levels of occupancy. I make an assumption to the non-COVID average occupancy based on what the restoring safe services report mentioned the occupancy was on April 22, 2020. This number may not be a true average but it is the best number I could find. The rest of the information was gathered from the daily bulletins the government releases and is accurate to May 2, 2020.

Finally got the images up

[Festivus]

Nice!

Scary projections out of the US today. Now projecting daily deaths will double by June 1st to 3,000 per day, and new death ranges are from 120k-240k, rather than 60k+ (they've already passed that, obviously). NYC and area is dropping, but the rest of the country is rising fast. Possibility of 200,000 new cases per day by June.

Even worse, the 3,000 deaths per day is at the 50% margin. So far deaths have been in the 97% percentile from previous projections. If that repeated, the US will have 15,000 deaths per day by mid-June.

Crazy that Republican-led states continue to push for loosening restrictions even as their daily cases and deaths continue to rise.

A headline from USA Today basically says it all: Reopening the Economy Would Add 233,000 Deaths by July but Save Millions of Jobs

Just horrible.

[Prairie_8487]

Originally Posted by rrskylar

Buddy with a small business and a couple employees can open but won’t said he’s paid enough taxes over the years and he’ll gladly collect what the govt. gives him for a few more months, think his employees applied and are collecting EI now!

Just wonder how many other businesses are doing the same and how many students who will collect FREE money rather than looking for work, most of the time govt. programs are a disincentive to “do for ones self”!

Paying people to stay home if they want to is still the right call from a health perspective. It will keep the flood gates from opening up all at once causing a wave of new cases.

During a non-pandemic time sure we don't want to pay people to sit at home and do nothing but right now it's in the best interest of public health. If people can work safely and get paid enough to justify going back, let them go back. If they want to stay on CERB for now, great. The fewer people rushing back into work the flatter the curve stays.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Prairie_8487

Paying people to stay home if they want to is still the right call from a health perspective. It will keep the flood gates from opening up all at once causing a wave of new cases.

During a non-pandemic time sure we don't want to pay people to sit at home and do nothing but right now it's in the best interest of public health. If people can work safely and get paid enough to justify going back, let them go back. If they want to stay on CERB for now, great. The fewer people rushing back into work the flatter the curve stays.

Wasn't that the whole point of what we've been doing for the last couple months? To minimize the spread of a highly contagious disease by getting people to stay at home as much as possible, even if it means not going to work?

Clearly if people aren't working they're going to need some extra help... it's needlessly petty and cruel to want to take that away from them. And incredibly short sighted too, because one of those people you force back to work prematurely could end up infecting you.

[esquire]

Totally anecdotal, but after a near-total absence I have noticed quite an upswing in out of province plates on the streets in the last week or two. Mostly from AB/ON, but even saw a couple of vehicles with ND tags in south Winnipeg.

[borkborkbork]

Originally Posted by esquire

Totally anecdotal, but after a near-total absence I have noticed quite an upswing in out of province plates on the streets in the last week or two. Mostly from AB/ON, but even saw a couple of vehicles with ND tags in south Winnipeg.

Saw a Quebec plate in SW Winnipeg this morning

[esquire]

Originally Posted by borkborkbork

Saw a Quebec plate in SW Winnipeg this morning

[bomberjet]

Is there any type of fine for that? Or is it just a finger wag don't do that again type thing. We wanted to go to BC this summer but have cancelled due to the restrictions.

However, Manitoba is open to visitors from western Canada and NW Ontario. So anyone from those places are permitted to travel here. It's just the part of say someone from BC travelling through Alberta and Saskatchewan to get her, which may not be permitted in those places still. And then when they go back do they need to self isolate for 14 days?

[esquire]

Originally Posted by bomberjet

Is there any type of fine for that? Or is it just a finger wag don't do that again type thing. We wanted to go to BC this summer but have cancelled due to the restrictions.

However, Manitoba is open to visitors from western Canada and NW Ontario. So anyone from those places are permitted to travel here. It's just the part of say someone from BC travelling through Alberta and Saskatchewan to get her, which may not be permitted in those places still. And then when they go back do they need to self isolate for 14 days?

You are allowed to go to BC. Details here:
https://time-to-travel.ca

The Maritimes are a question mark as of now which is why I cancelled my trip there and replaced it with one to the Rockies instead.