HALIFAX: Dr. Robert Strang, Nova Scotia’s chief medical officer of health, Premier Stephen McNeil and Minister of Health and Wellness Randy Delorey today announced measures to further prevent the spread of COVID-19 and increase capacity within the health system to respond.
Effective immediately: doctors and pharmacists have new options for virtual care, using telephone and secure videoconferencing; pharmacists can renew prescriptions for most medications and government will cover the assessment fee; employers cannot require a doctor’s note if an employee must be off work; the College of Physicians and Surgeons is waiving the fee for retired doctors to renew their licences so they can come back to work; retired and other nurses are being brought into the system to assist with 811 staffing; and all service providers funded through the Department of Community Services’ Disability Support Program – including social enterprises, day programs, and supported employment programs for adults with diverse abilities – will close to participants and the public
Effective midnight (March 19), personal service and fitness establishments such as hair salons, barber shops, spas, nail salons, body art establishments and gyms must shut down.
Anyone who has travelled outside of Canada must self-isolate for 14 days when they return to Nova Scotia. If you have been in close contact with someone who has travelled and are experiencing fever (above 38 degrees Celsius) and/or new cough should complete the on-line questionnaire before calling 811. The on-line questionnaire can be found at: https://811.novascotia.ca/.
Nova Scotians can find accurate, up-to-date information, handwashing posters and fact sheets at: https://novascotia.ca/coronavirus.
Testing numbers are updated daily at: https://novascotia.ca/coronavirus.
Effective at 12:01 a.m. on March 19, Parks Canada is temporarily suspending all visitor services in all national parks, national historic sites and national marine conservation areas across the country until further notice. The agency will be monitoring the situation and will communicate regularly.
Parks Canada will limit its activities to basic critical operations and many staff will work from home. Visitor facilities will be closed temporarily, including washrooms and day use facilities. Some conservation activities will also be temporarily suspended, including projects with external researchers.
While visitor services are temporarily suspended, Parks Canada will continue to deliver a number of critical functions, including highway management and snow removal, fire response, dam operations and water management on historic waterways, as well as avalanche forecasting and control, among others.
Visitors may use front country and backcountry areas, as well as accessible green spaces. Should Canadians decide to visit, they should remember that they are always responsible for their own safety. They should consult Parks Canada’s Web site to be prepared for their visit and be aware of any area closures. Search and rescue services may be limited. Visitors should exercise additional caution at this time and avoid activities with safety risks.
There are a number of tourism businesses and operations within Parks Canada places. These operators are valued partners and provide important services to visitors. They may continue to operate and clients should check with them before visiting to ensure that there has been no change to their services.
Parks Canada will cease taking new reservations until April 30. All existing reservations for this period will be refunded in full. In addition, the agency is currently developing an approach to honour passes, in light of travel restrictions and closures related to COVID-19. Details will be communicated in due course.
A complete list of Parks Canada places that are closed and the parameters of these closures will be available on the Parks Canada Web site soon. Please visit pc.gc.ca regularly for updates.
Many Nova Scotia Health Authority (NSHA) services are being reduced or suspended until further notice as part of the effort to contain the spread of COVID-19 as well as to conserve and redeploy our resources in anticipation of increasing demand related to the pandemic.
This means that beginning today all elective outpatient visits are cancelled. Individual services will contact patients whose appointments are proceeding. Dialysis, chemotherapy and radiation treatments, and mental health and addictions appointments will continue.
All non-urgent diagnostic imaging appointments will be rescheduled and walk-in x-ray services will be closed. Cancer Care imaging, PET scans and other time-sensitive exams will continue.
Outpatient blood collection services will not close completely but services will be reduced (i.e. reduction in hours and number of locations). Details regarding these changes will be communicated as soon as they are available.
All same-day admission and elective surgical procedures are postponed. Cancer and urgent/emergency procedures will continue.
As currently-occupied inpatient beds become available, they will be held open to create capacity to establish COVID units in designated hospitals.
As much as possible, NSHA is contacting scheduled patients and clients directly to notify them of cancellations.
A number of NSHA facilities had already reduced surgical schedules for a routine slowdown coinciding with March break. This has helped to minimize the impact of the change at this time, although some surgeries have already been impacted.
Information on changes to these and other service interruptions is being compiled and posted on the NSHA Web site as it is confirmed: http://www.nshealth.ca/temporaryclosures.
For more information and updates about NSHA’s response to COVID-19 please visit: http://www.nshealth.ca/coronavirus.
Nova Scotia Health Authority is extending visitor restrictions at all facilities to limit the spread of respiratory illness, including COVID-19.
No visitors are permitted in any of NSHA’s hospitals.
There are compassionate and supportive care exceptions in consultation with the care team, they are: patients at end-of-life; a designated person per patient is permitted in labour and delivery rooms; parent/guardian with pediatric patients; and substitute decision makers as required for plan of care.
In these circumstances, the visitor/ support person will be named and limited to one person. Multiple people waiting in hallways, family rooms or waiting rooms is not acceptable given requirements to social distance. In the case of pediatric patients, an exception may be considered for two parents in consultation with care team.
Visitor restrictions are a series of infection control measures put in place to reduce the risk of spreading infectious diseases which are common in health care facilities. They are designed to help keep clients, families, staff and visitors healthy and safe.
Automated appointment reminders in the Central Zone have been stopped.
All Mental Health and Addiction group-based therapies and group programming will be paused. Urgent and non-urgent one-to-one outpatient clinics will continue. Patients will also have the choice to move their in-person sessions to take place over the phone, where appropriate, or through a secure video conferencing platform, where available.
The following Mental Health and Addiction services will pause: all group-based programs, group therapies/ treatments, and community outreach visits; non-urgent home visits; adolescent Outreach Services (including CaperBase Outreach Services) and Schools Plus, offered in various schools across the province; Addictions Day Treatment/Wellness Programming at Strait Richmond Hospital in Evanston and at Cape Breton Regional Hospital in Sydney; and Driving While Impaired and Smoking/Tobacco/Nicotine Cessation programming.
Access Nova Scotia and Registry of Motor Vehicle Offices are temporarily closing for one week to establish new ways of providing service to minimize contact between people. Offices are expected to reopen March 25.
Government is also extending the date for driver licences and vehicle registrations expiring in March, April and May to August 31. All law enforcement agencies have been notified of the extensions.
Some of the services offered through Access Nova Scotia and Registry of Motor Vehicle Offices are available on-line at: https://www.novascotia.ca/sns/access/online-services.asp.
Effectively immediately, there are to be no gatherings of more than 50 people.
The measures below come into effect at 12:01 a.m., on March 19: restaurants are restricted to take-out and delivery only and no in-person dining; drinking establishments, winery and distillery tasting rooms and craft taprooms must close; and private liquor stores can continue to operate and craft breweries, wineries and distilleries can continue to sell their product from their storefronts.
The Government of Canada has issued a travel advisory asking Canadians to avoid non-essential travel outside Canada until further notice.
The Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation (NSLC) is adjusting the hours of its stores.
All stores will be open to all customers from 11 a.m. until 7 p.m., Monday to Saturday. Stores will be open an hour earlier, from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m., for seniors and customers who are at higher risk of contracting the virus. Stores will be closed Sundays. Agency stores will follow the same hours.
These shorter business hours will allow time for employees to thoroughly clean stores and to re-stock product. The NSLC has sufficient inventory, so there is no need to buy extra product. Customers can purchase cannabis and a limited selection of beverage alcohol on-line. While Canada Post normally provides home delivery of cannabis purchases, it currently requires customers to pick it up at their post office. Any on-line beverage alcohol purchases will have to be picked up in an NSLC store.
For more information, check out the Nova Scotia Health Authority at: https://www.nshealth.ca, and the IWK Health Centre at: http://www.iwk.nshealth.ca/. The Public Health Agency of Canada maintains a list of affected areas: https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/diseases/2019-novel-coronavirus-infection/health-professionals/covid-19-affected-areas-list.html. For more from the Government of Canada, check out: https://canada.ca/coronavirus or call the Government of Canada toll-free information line at 1-833-784-4397.
For information from Nova Scotia Public Health offices, go to: http://www.nshealth.ca/public-health-offices.