COVID-19 Monitor

Last Updated:October 15, 2020

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Employee well-being growing area of post-pandemic focus for employers: survey (Benefits Canada) Published on: June 15, 2020 | Category: Canadian Business

While 72 per cent of Canadian employers said they’ll make minimal or no changes to their benefits coverage in 2021, 21 per cent are planning some plan design changes around health coverage, according to a new survey by Arther J. Gallagher & Co.
Among those planning changes, eight per cent said they’re looking at plan design and contribution structure changes, while just four per cent said they expect to make major strategic changes to their benefits offerings.
As well, 37 per cent said they plan to include additional support for emotional well-being, 19 per cent said they’ll up their financial well-being support, 10 per cent plan will increase community/social support and six per cent said they’ll offer additional physical support.

Governments May Revisit Postwar Playbook as They Tackle Huge Debts (WSJ) Published on: June 14, 2020 | Category: Economic Impact

In the U.S. and elsewhere, government debt is set to soar this year, reflecting lower tax revenue and the cost of financial aid to businesses and households during lockdowns.
The International Monetary Fund forecasts that U.S. government debt will reach 131% of annual economic output this year, up from 109% in 2019.
Some people thinking about how to pay down the debt are looking at an approach used after World War II: financial repression, or policies that ensure that interest rates remain low.

Korea crushed a huge coronavirus outbreak. Can it beat a second wave? (Honolulu Star-Advertiser) Published on: June 14, 2020 | Category: Global Response

South Korea became one of the world’s top virus success stories by learning from past experiences.
Now it’s using lessons from a fresh spate of clusters to prepare for what officials say will be an inevitable second wave.
Steps taken include introducing entry registration for nightclubs and gyms, requiring tracking and health-monitoring phone apps for foreign visitors, and installing mask vending machines in parks and subways.

Fauci says second wave is ‘not inevitable’ as coronavirus cases climb in some states (CTV News) Published on: June 13, 2020 | Category: Global Response

Most Americans are adhering to CDC guidelines introduced to mitigate the pandemic, according to a survey from the CDC.
In the survey released Friday, close to 80 per cent of Americans surveyed nationwide said they had self-isolated last month and 85 per cent of New Yorkers said they had when the survey was conducted in May.
And 84.3 per cent of those surveyed believed their state’s mitigation strategies were the right balance or even not restrictive enough, the survey team, led by the CDC’s Michael Tynan, said in the agency’s weekly report.

Florida fired its coronavirus data scientist. Now she’s publishing the statistics on her own. (Washington Post) Published on: June 13, 2020 | Category: Economic Impact, Leadership

Tension built for days between Florida Department of Health supervisors and the department’s geographic information systems manager before officials showed her the door, she says, permanently pulling her off the coronavirus dashboard that she operated for weeks.
Managers had wanted Rebekah Jones to make certain changes to the public-facing portal, she says. Jones had objected to — and sometimes refused to comply with — what she saw as unethical requests.
White House coronavirus response coordinator Deborah Birx praised Florida’s official coronavirus dashboard in April as a beacon of transparency.
But Jones has asserted that the site undercounts the state’s infection total and overcounts the number of people tested — with the official numbers bolstering the decision to start loosening restrictions on the economy in early May, when the state had not met federal guidelines for reopening.

More funding, health, equity measures needed ahead of September school reopening: OSSTF (CBC) Published on: June 13, 2020 | Category: Canadian Business, Global Response

The union representing thousands of Ontario high school teachers and education workers is raising the alarm over what it calls “clear risks” involved with reopening public schools in September in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Among other things, the union is calling on the government to provide more personal protective equipment, more cleaning and more funding for the increased staffing it says will be needed to keep everyone as safe as possible from the novel coronavirus.
Though Ontario Education Minister Stephen Lecce says a full plan for reopening the province’s schools will be released by the end of June — including measures to ensure physical distancing and restrictions on the movement of students at school — Bischof says the province needs to take additional steps in its reopening plan, and do it quickly.

One country, two pandemics: what COVID-19 reveals about inequality in Canada (CBC) Published on: June 13, 2020 | Category: Canadian Business, Economic Impact

A new analysis conducted by CBC News of cases in Montreal, for instance, found strong correlations linking higher rates of COVID-19 infections with low-income neighbourhoods and neighbourhoods with higher percentages of Black residents.
Public health officials in Ontario reported last week that the rates of infection and death from COVID-19 were disproportionately higher in the province’s most ethnically and culturally diverse neighbourhoods.
The rate of hospitalizations in those hard-hit communities was four times higher. The rate of death was twice as high.
In a working paper published this week, four Canadian economists reported that the employment losses in April were greater for younger, low-wage and non-unionized workers, with “public facing” sectors like retail and restaurants hit the hardest.

Employers want to rehire and workers want to return, but the road back is full of obstacles (The Globe and Mail) Published on: June 13, 2020 | Category: Canadian Business

Just 15 per cent of small businesses said their sales have returned to normal, according to a recent survey by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB).
Among companies that recently struggled to recall or recruit staff, 60 per cent of owners said prospective workers were concerned about physical health, the CFIB found.
The number of employed Canadians climbed by about 290,000 in May, unwinding just less than 10 per cent of the three million jobs that were shed in March and April.

Trudeau’s call with premiers gets testy as leaders butt heads over funding to reopen economy (CBC) Published on: June 12, 2020 | Category: Canadian Business, Economic Impact

Thursday evening’s weekly call between Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the premiers was marked by testy exchanges over the federal government’s pledge of $14 billion to help provinces reopen their economies and the future of the military in Quebec’s long-term care facilities, according to federal and provincial sources with knowledge of the call.
When Trudeau announced the $14 billion on June 5, he said it would be earmarked for specific measures to help provinces reopen their economies safely.
Those measures include the purchase of personal protective equipment (PPE) for frontline healthcare workers and businesses.

Businesses Want Virus Legal Protection. Workers Are Worried. (NY Times) Published on: June 12, 2020 | Category: Economic Impact, Global Response

The stock exchange required Mr. Corpina and others who work there to acknowledge that returning to work could expose them to the coronavirus, and to promise not to sue if they were infected.
Whether companies are liable if their workers and customers catch the coronavirus has become a key question as businesses seek to reopen around the country.
Companies and universities — and the groups that represent them — say they are vulnerable to a wave of lawsuits if they reopen while the coronavirus continues to circulate widely, and they are pushing Congress for temporary legal protections they say will help get the economy running again.

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