Ontario’s decision to drop mask mandate puts politics ahead of science, risking gains made

Toronto, March 9, 2022. The Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario (RNAO) says the government’s decision to drop the province’s mandatory mask mandate in most indoors settings is ill-conceived and puts politics ahead of science. And, so is dropping vaccine mandates in long-term care homes.

RNAO releases its 2022 provincial election platform; calls on party leaders to prioritize Ontarians’ health

To help steer the province through the effects of a devastating pandemic, RNAO released a provincial election platform during its annual Queen’s Park Day. Ontario’s nursing crisis: Your health, your health system outlines recommendations it wants all political parties to adopt ahead of the June 2 election. The recommendations cover five key areas that shape people’s ability to be healthy: the environment, social determinants of health, nursing, care delivery and fiscal capacity.

Prioritize health system pressures ahead of lifting public health measures: RNAO says

RNAO issued a media release on Jan. 20 following the government’s announcement that it plans to start lifting public health measures. The Ontario government’s announcement today to ease public health measures beginning Jan. 31 is premature and will prolong the current health system crisis, says RNAO.

Re: A health system on the verge of total collapse – An open letter to Premier Doug Ford

RNAO issued a letter to Premier Doug Ford on Jan. 5, 2022. As the fifth wave of this pandemic rages, the cracks in our health system are clear for all to see. The reactive and last-minute management of this pandemic must end. There is no separate trajectory for Ontario’s economy while this virus ravages the people of this province and threatens to bring our health system to its knees. Ontarians desperately need the help of the nursing profession to succeed in fighting Omicron. As the premier of this province, it is on you to bring hope back to our nursing profession.

Omicron edition: Uncertainty, uncertainty, uncertainty

What do we know about the Omicron variant of concern? The following is a 28 November article by Zeynep Tufekci that appeared in her blog Insight. She is an associate professor at the School of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with an affiliate appointment at the Department of Sociology.