Health Committee on May 27th, 2020

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Right, exactly.

For 11 of the airport suspensions, it turns out that they're are all centred in a single province. Imagine that—11 of those airports in one province. Unfortunately, those are all planned for my province of B.C., which I imagine is going to significantly affect our air ambulance service here.

What would you say to our people here who are having to deal with these closures at night in 11 of our airports? I imagine that these would be airports that service rural areas.

[Dr. Homer Tien]

I think the airports fall within the jurisdiction of an essential service, especially in the pandemic. Not knowing the communities, I can't speak to the impact on the communities, but if they were rural and remote—and generally they tend to be rural and remote—there'd be a tremendous impact on their ability to access critical care services.

They wouldn't be able to get out of the community and, if they needed any critical supplies or HR resources, they wouldn't be able to get into their communities. I would think that it would have a tremendous effect.

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Yes, exactly. I was looking at the list and I noticed that there are absolutely no suspensions in either Ontario or Quebec. I was wondering if you are at all concerned that they might announce expansions of these closures for your province.

[Dr. Homer Tien]

I would be, absolutely. There have been issues for a variety of reasons, and we're very concerned about airports and their ability to function, because we are completely dependent on them, especially for our fixed-wing aircraft.

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

I understand that you are short on PPE. I think I saw that in one of the presentations here.

Today, I asked the Minister of Public Services and Procurement exactly how organizations—for instance, fire halls, homeless shelters and paramedic and ambulance services—are supposed to ensure that they can access PPE when shortages continue to be a very serious problem. We're seeing that here locally.

She assured me that their government is doing an amazing job of sourcing PPE, both here and abroad, but have you seen an increase in PPE availability?

[Dr. Homer Tien]

When I said we were short on PPE, I think that was at the very beginning of the pandemic. We've been actively working with the provincial healthy ministry, and we've also been looking at reusable PPE as a backup. With our current run rate, we're not short of PPE because they—

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

You're not expecting that you would have to start to ration PPE at this point in time because you're actually able to reuse. Is that the case?

[Dr. Homer Tien]

We have a reusable stock. When we were short, we were looking for washable gowns, washable face masks and washable masks, and then the normal sorts of PPE that we'd get through the government as well. We pursued all avenues.

[Tamara Jansen, Conservative, Cloverdale—Langley City, BC]

Okay.

Maybe I could go to you, Ms. Polsinelli. I have noticed that at least three of our witnesses today are talking about seeking PPE donations from the community, and I know that my local battered women's shelter, the homeless shelter and the fire hall are all seeking PPE.

With the current directive from Dr. Tam for all Canadians to wear masks in public, are you concerned that those types of donations will dry up going forward and you may have to either ration PPE or curtail services?

[Nancy Polsinelli]

At this point we have enough supply of PPE. We are looking at it from two perspectives.

We do accept donations today, and we are looking to continue doing that. Oftentimes the donations are for particular agencies, so we will reroute donations to those agencies or through our community response table. We do have agencies that continue to be concerned about their PPE supply. They don't have the amount, the money or the storage capacity. We are trying to provide support from those perspectives.

Internally, we do have front-line staff, whether it be in our long-term care homes, in our paramedic services or in shelters. Similar to Dr. Tam, in the early days of COVID, we had lots of concern. There has also been lots of learning. We have worked very closely with Ontario Health. We are using an equitable distribution methodology to get PPE out. We've also brought together, for the entire region, a central logistics division so that we can really make sure that we always have that threshold supply, and again, we are working with Ontario Health. We've also worked very closely with our hospital partners in Peel so that there's always at least a three-week supply in our storage and inventory, so that doesn't pose a problem for us. That's how we're looking at it today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you.

I will go now to Mr. Kelloway.

Please go ahead. You have five minutes.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Hello, colleagues.

To the witnesses, you have my sincere appreciation for the work you do on a daily basis.

I've had the opportunity to study leadership and I taught it at the University of Calgary for a couple of years. Often we would hit a chapter called “servant leadership”. You folks, every one of you, and your colleagues are the embodiment of that. So thank you very much for your servant leadership in everything that you do.

I have two questions. The first one is for Mr. Sauvé from the Red Cross.

In my riding of Cape Breton—Canso, I often hear from first nations chiefs and leaders, Mi’kmaq leaders and chiefs, about what more can be done from a federal government perspective to support community development in first nations across Cape Breton and northeastern Nova Scotia.

I know you folks are in partnership with Indigenous Services Canada and you're working with indigenous communities across the country to provide support to communities in need. I'm interested in learning more about the work you're doing. Perhaps you can unpack that a bit and go a little deeper in terms of the work you're doing in first nations communities. How many communities have you been able to help across the country during COVID?

[Conrad Sauvé]

We've actually set up a virtual assistance program.

I'm going to go back a little bit to what my colleague from Ornge was talking about, as well. We have a modular capacity—so a small capacity—to deploy not full field hospitals but a smaller capacity. We've been getting a lot of requests around providing additional equipment as well so that communities that are isolated can set up quarantine structures. That's not medical stuff; it's basic blankets, cots, and so on.

I think one of the biggest areas we're looking at is training and advice. There was a big concern, of course, at the beginning of COVID. We got a lot of requests to deploy full equipment in case something were to happen. Where we're getting a lot of questions is around deploying expertise, people who have experience in helping the communities set up, accompanying the community in terms of how to set up properly, and providing ongoing training. Ongoing training is a big area.

To refer to a previous question for all organizations, we have purchased, with the support of the federal government, some PPE for community-based organizations—and first nations fall into that, as well—in the form of kits that will be available for the next few months. We have enough kits for 5,000 organizations, and we want to increase that quite a bit.

We've set up a 24-hour call centre for first nations communities in five different languages to answer, basically, all the requests and to direct people to the right place for all the types of supports. There's a lot of effort in terms of training, ongoing training and building local capacity. In any situation, such as an emergency, the first response happens locally. We need to send in specialized teams after that, but it's first about how we can build local capacity.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

You speak of training. Can you give us a little more detail as to what areas of training specifically? I'm very curious about that.

[Conrad Sauvé]

I think the biggest area that has increased following this response is we've built an expertise in infection training and control internationally that we've brought domestically, so we're getting a lot of requests from institutions and organizations to send in an expert. A lot of material is available online, but to accompany them and understand the activities they're organizing, and how they can do that safely for their personnel, their volunteers and themselves is where we're getting the most requests.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

I'm glad to see you're looking at developing capacity in the communities, in collaboration with first nations communities, considering we're perhaps looking at a second and a third wave. I appreciate that.

Mr. Chair, how much time do I have left?

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

You have 40 seconds left.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Okay.

Ms. York, given that those experiencing homelessness don't have access to the same amenities such as Internet and cable, how do we ensure they know how to recognize the signs and symptoms of COVID-19? How can we raise awareness and reach those experiencing homelessness in other ways, perhaps looking at this from an urban and a rural lens? In urban often it's visible, in rural it's not, but it's still very prevalent.

[Fiona York]

We can, in a number of ways. Early on there is peer deployment. I think peers are really effective and a good way to provide information. A lot of that was done through direct one-to-one information sharing and posters. Even prior to the pandemic we often saw that doing things by word of mouth and through posters in the community is a really effective way to communicate. Also, there have been solicitations and donations of phones to people through companies and community groups. That's been really great. That was more recently.

There's also been advocacy around opening up Wi-Fi and making that available to people in the community, having even just a Downtown Eastside or community-wide Wi-Fi. I think those things could be replicated to some degree in smaller communities as well. I think peers always have a really important place. They're in the best position in many ways to speak to their peers, and have the lived experience to do that effectively. Making use of non-digital forms of communication, like posters and handouts, is really great, having that conversation one on one and then also advocating for the digital tools and resources as well.

[Mike Kelloway, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Ron McKinnon]

Thank you, Mr. Kelloway.

Mr. Desilets, you have two and a half minutes.

[Luc Desilets, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Polsinelli, how do you view the current crisis in Quebec?

This may be a little outside your area of expertise. However, I'd really like to hear your views on this matter, please.

[Nancy Polsinelli]

Do you mean the crisis in long-term care?

[Luc Desilets, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Yes, exactly. I'm thinking of the situation in the residences.

[Nancy Polsinelli]

Thank you.

It is certainly a very unfortunate situation. I have every confidence that when individuals go to work in long-term care their expectation, their need, is to support residents. I think that what is happening, unfortunately—and you see some similarities in Ontario—is the inability to get the work done in this COVID environment.

What COVID has taught us is that there are staffing issues. If we do not have the staff, then we cannot provide the right care to our residents or those who are living in the homes. If we do not have the funding, then we cannot train our staff to be prepared for a COVID pandemic such as what we've experienced.

I do believe that, through the province and through the federal government, there will be improvements. This is a systemic issue. It is not an issue that has just arisen today. It's a systemic issue. I believe that, through the federal government, there should be a component of long-term care as a national act, so that there is more oversight.

I have to say that I also believe that while we go in and improve the situation in this emergency, there are also long-term improvements that must be made. I'll go back to emotional care. It is not necessarily about making things more “command and control” through legislation, but about ensuring that legislation also involves emotional care, a different type of expectation for our staff in long-term care and one so that they too will thrive, one where staff will enjoy coming to work and supporting those residents they care for.

Those are some of the things. It is about staffing. It is about funding. It is about getting the feds to support, but certainly it is long-standing, and a lot of work needs to be done that is not—I'm going to say it again before I get closed—about the command and control. It is about how we support our residents and our staff in an emotional-based culture.