Public sector health workers in Medicine Hat march on the sidewalk outside of the Medicine Hat Regional Hospital earlier this year. (CHAT News file photo)

By Alex McCuaig

Circuit breaker approach

AUPE says measures announced Thursday not enough

Nov 12, 2020 | 5:22 PM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Calls by provincial doctors and unions representing health-care workers for increased measures to combat a surge in COVID-19 cases in Alberta were partially met after new restrictions were announced by Premier Jason Kenney this afternoon.

The letter asks for directives to work from home for those able to do so, limit contacts to those within a household and suspension of a range of indoor activities. It’s signed by the heads of the three main health-care unions representing support staff, paramedics and nurses along with more than 400 Alberta doctors.

The letter says schools should remain open due to their importance.

But it stated incremental measures will no longer suffice.

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“Our testing system is strained and contact tracing capacities have collapsed,” reads the letter.

Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE) vice-president Susan Slade says a short, sharp period of increased public health restrictions – known as a circuit breaker – will allow those working in health facilities to catch their breath as they are becoming inundated due to the record rise of COVID-19 cases seen in the last week.

“We’re hearing about constant short staffing. We’re hearing that members are working copious amounts of overtime just to ensure that patients are being looked after,” said Slade. “And also that there is burnout happening.”

Slade says measures announced by the province this afternoon imposing some restrictions on indoor activities in areas of the province under enhanced designations (more than 50 cases per 100,000 people) do little to address what the letter was asking for.

As of Thursday afternoon, Medicine Hat is sitting at 41.1 cases per 100,000.

Slade says the increase of COVID-19 cases is also negatively affecting other AUPE members from corrections officers to social workers.