The Ontario Council of Hospital Unions wants the provincial government to declare COVID-19 an airborne virus.
President Michael Hurley says it’s an important distinction, especially for health care workers.
“It means that in many of the institutions, including in the northwest, you’ve got people who should be provided with respiratory protection of a higher level and they can’t it. This only adds to the risk of the spread of the virus. It’s a very bad combination.”
Hurley says the situation is the same as SARS more than a decade ago.
“You’ve got an eerie replay of the same phenomenon where you got a respiratory virus that’s airborne. The government denies that it’s airborne. Won’t provide people with the protection that you need to protect yourself against an airborne virus.”
Hurley says the federal government has already declared COVID-19 an airborne illness, but for some reason the province won’t.
He says scientific evidence has emerged proving the virus is air born.
