RNAO issued the following media release upon announcement of the Ontario government’s plan for reopening of schools on August 3, 2021.

There is little doubt that school reopening in September is one of the most crucial policy decisions in terms of the handling of the COVID-19 pandemic in Ontario and everywhere else. Ontario has about two million school age children and 160,000 teachers – those are huge numbers.

We received the following message from Dr. Jennifer Kwan, a family physician, inviting health providers to add their signature to a petition calling on mandatory masks in Canada in three high-risk settings: all indoor spaces outside the home, crowds, and public transit. We support this request wholeheartedly and I already signed and urge you to do the same! And – as important – let’s start to personally abide by this call.

RNAO wants to stress the critical importance of engaging those plans in a responsible and cautious way. If we move to open the economy too fast we risk a second surge that would overwhelm the health care system. In such a case, not only we would lose many lives that can be saved, but also the economy would get a double hit by having to go back to a full lockdown.