Mask up

Even days ago, it was pretty obvious what the topic of this week’s editorial would be.
If you left the house and entered a public space this weekend, you were obliged by provincial decree to cover your face with some kind of barrier, be it some homemade cloth job or a full on respirator.
Quebec Public Health Director Dr. Horacio Arruda went from . . .

advocating that masks provided a false sense of security to advocating their use in situations where physical distancing could not be maintained on April 25. Nearly three months after Quebec’s top doctor recommended a mask when in close quarters with others, Quebec’s legislators are finally getting around to the issue. Why did it take until the cases across the province dwindled to enact this new regulation?
These kinds of decisions are made by primarily political advisors, not medical ones. With cases in the US surging and Montreal’s bars re-opening, there’s a lot of fear that we could be hit by a second wave (and there is evidence to back it up).
Quebec currently boasts the largest death toll in the country and a health minister has already been canned over the bungled response to the virus. Public satisfaction with Premier Legault’s handling of the crisis, which polls proclaimed was once around 95 per cent in April, has deteriorated significantly since then. The CAQ are vulnerable on this issue and need to be seen doing something.
Perhaps at an earlier stage in the country’s crusade against the virus, public health officials were worried about sourcing masks for health care workers in a time when supply chains were severely disrupted. But dillydallying until last weekend is, to paraphrase what one local bar owner told the equity in an interview last week, a bit like putting a condom on after getting a woman pregnant. Similar to the government’s slapdash closure of this region’s borders, this latest change in the rules seems more than a little ham-fisted.
Masks are not a perfect tool by any means. They are only effective if used in conjunction with diligent hand washing and physical distancing. Public health authorities have opened up testing to everyone, but this region has seen a lower participation rate than the greater Ottawa area for some unknown reason.
It’s easy to look back in hindsight and criticize decisions that were made in the midst of an unprecedented public health crisis, but the discourse around mask usage has been frustrating to witness.
By flip-flopping, public health officials at both the federal and provincial level have lost credibilty with the populace and given fuel to COVID deniers and conspiracy theorists.
Also, when will this new mandate be lifted? Will Pontiac residents be saddled with this (admittedly minor) inconvenience until cases have subsided in Canada’s COVID capital, Montreal? What metric will officials use to decide when going mask-free is acceptable?
It should go without saying, but any frustration people feel over this issue should be directed at people in positions of power, not the clerk at the grocery store trying to do their job by enforcing the rules.
Stay safe and look out for your neighbours. Things won’t be back to normal for quite some time.

Caleb Nickerson