Legault opens door to another delay for mandatory vaccines among health-care workers
Premier François Legault opened the door on Monday to another postponement of the mandatory vaccination of health-care workers.
In a series of interviews given in the morning, he mentioned the shortage of personnel to justify a possible postponement of the Nov. 15 deadline.
Originally, all Quebec health-care workers had to be properly vaccinated by Oct. 15 or risk being suspended without pay.
The Legault government was unable to carry out the threat because it would have deprived the system of approximately 22,000 workers, putting too much pressure on services.
Health Minister Christian Dubé ended up extending the deadline to Nov. 15.
According to the government's most recent report, 19,634 health and social services workers are still not adequately vaccinated, including 13,714 who have not received any doses.
On Monday, Legault suggested in an interview on 98.5 FM that mandatory vaccination would not be imposed on the entire network, but rather on certain sectors, in certain regions.
"We hope to be able to apply the decree. We will certainly be able to apply it in certain places," he said. "In the emergency room, it is certain that it must be applied because there is a very close contact with the patients. There are areas where we will be able to implement it."
"What we want is to apply it everywhere," said Legault went on to point out that only 3 per cent of nurses have refused the vaccination, but "it's a 3 per cent that we need because we're already short of 4,000," he said.
On QUB radio, the premier said that "it will depend a lot on the recruitment of nurses," before adding: "There are surely some groups where there will be no carry-over."
Quebec is offering bonuses of $12,000 to $18,000, for a total of up to $1 billion, to bring at least 4,000 nurses back into the public health care system in the coming months.
Dubé recently said 1,756 people had accepted the offer: 58 were retired, 351 were from private agencies and 1,347 were part-time and moved to full-time.
- This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Oct. 25, 2021.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
More than 115 cases of eye damage reported in Ontario after solar eclipse
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
Toxic testing standoff: Family leaves house over air quality
A Sherwood Park family says their new house is uninhabitable. The McNaughton's say they were forced to leave the house after living there for only a week because contaminants inside made it difficult to breathe.
Decoy bear used to catch man who illegally killed a grizzly, B.C. conservation officers say
A man has been handed a lengthy hunting ban and fined thousands of dollars for illegally killing a grizzly bear, B.C. conservation officers say.
B.C. seeks ban on public drug use, dialing back decriminalization
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
OPP responds to apparent video of officer supporting anti-Trudeau government protestors
The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) says it's investigating an interaction between a uniformed officer and anti-Trudeau government protestors after a video circulated on social media.
An emergency slide falls off a Delta Air Lines plane, forcing pilots to return to JFK in New York
An emergency slide fell off a Delta Air Lines jetliner shortly after takeoff Friday from New York, and pilots who felt a vibration in the plane circled back to land safely at JFK Airport.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau on navigating post-political life, co-parenting and freedom
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
Last letters of pioneering climber who died on Everest reveal dark side of mountaineering
George Mallory is renowned for being one of the first British mountaineers to attempt to scale the dizzying heights of Mount Everest during the 1920s. Nearly a century later, newly digitized letters shed light on Mallory’s hopes and fears about ascending Everest.
Loud boom in Hamilton caused by propane tank, police say
A loud explosion was heard across Hamilton on Friday after a propane tank was accidentally destroyed and detonated at a local scrap metal yard, police say.