Editorial – It seems like it’s one step forward, two or even three steps backwards for the Haliburton Kawartha Pine Ridge District Health Unit.
Previous to the Acting Medical Officer of Health Dr. Ian Gemmill the community heard very little from the local health unit in terms of pandemic.
No press conferences, very little communication just to name a few items.
The public and media were left wondering many times.
Businesses would confirm cases of COVID long before the health unit.
It didn’t take long for Dr. Gemmill to make an impact after he started around December.
Weekly press conferences with the media has allowed the media to ask questions which in turns helps the community understand.
Up until Wednesday, February 10, 2021 it’s been an overwhelming success.
Yesterday’s press conference was, to say the least shocking and confusing.
It started out as usual with Dr. Gemmill stating what is new in the area concerning COVID-19. Lot’s of information that is always appreciated.
It was a 41-minute meeting with Dr. Gemmill speaking on a variety of interesting topics from his home in Kingston for just over 13-minutes before turning it over to the media for questions.
Today’s Northumberland asked the first question about whose responsibility it is to release if there is an outbreak at a business in the area?
Dr. Gemmill reiterated a story about a case of diphtheria in a school that happened 35-years ago and no one knew until the annual report was released.
“It’s not because we were trying to hide anything, it’s just the people that needed to know, family affected and all the kids in the school, the parents all knew.”
“That’s been the principle I’ve always dealt with, the people that need to know, should know and the public should know when there is a need for them to know as well – when there is a risk.”
But Dr. Gemmill does admit with the absence of information from the Health Unit, people turn to social media.
“And what happens is people start to fill in the blanks. It’s actually harder to correct things that are wrong then to just make a public statement.”
“People who are exposed to coronavirus or any other disease will hear from us,” Dr. Gemmill assures the public.
But trust comes with transparency. When the media reports outbreaks and days later the local health unit comes out with a release confirming it, the trust is lost from the community.
The public needs to know this to alleviate concern. To put them at ease.
But one issue that has been a hot topic which has been happening for several months was brought up.
The health unit does not give lower tier numbers of persons with COVID-19.
In other words, we only hear the numbers of people that have COVID in Northumberland County. Not the lower tier areas like Cobourg, Port Hope, Brighton, Cramahe Township, Hamilton Township, Alnwick/Haldimand Township, and Trent Hills.
Today’s Northumberland has spoken to Port Hope resident Randy Fallis several times about his concerns that numbers need to be released from lower tier municipalities.
Given that it takes over an hour to get from one end of the county to the other, a number of people have raised concerns they need to know the results from their own municipalities.
But the health unit has been steadfast in refusing to give that information since the beginning of the pandemic stating it’s a privacy issue and could possibly identify the person. Fallis has gone to the Information and Privacy Commission several months ago and we are still awaiting the final decision.
But after a member of the media asked about the numbers of people infected in the Brighton and Trent Hills area, to the shock of many media, Dr. Gemmill gave the results.
“As you know in general for the public we are reporting the cases by mainly the upper tier municipalities. It’s been done that way for a year.”
“I don’t think it’s any secret to tell you the majority of cases right now are in the Municipality of Kawartha Lakes.”
“For Brighton we’ve had three cases in the last two weeks as of Monday.”
After confirming that Campbellford was in Trent Hills, Dr. Gemmill stated there had been two cases.
Stating this left a few people dumbfounded. This was information that media and the public has been waiting for months for the health unit to release. The health unit has always withheld the information stating privacy concerns.
Today’s Northumberland decided to followup asking for the numbers in Cobourg and Port Hope.
“There is nothing really to secret about this stuff,” said Dr. Gemmill.
“I think the concern in some parts of Ontario including HKPR in the past has been “oh can people be identified,” but we’ve had almost 1,000 cases.”
“We’ve had dozens of cases in Kawartha Lakes, but only eight in the last two weeks in Cobourg and seven in Port Hope.”
Another member of the media asked about the one COVID variant case in the health units region.
Dr. Gemmill not only stated it was Northumberland County, but said the person “resides in the Port Hope area” but works outside the area and wasn’t sure where the person picked up the variant, but all of the contacts have been quarantined.
Stating the results in Cobourg, Port Hope, Trent Lakes and Brighton, the only other three areas of Northumberland County are Cramahe, Alnwick Haldimand and Hamilton Township.
So Today’s Northumberland e-mailed, Chandra Tremblay who is the Manger of Corporate Services, Communications and IT at the health unit after the press conference to see if we could receive those numbers.
This is where it gets very confusing.
Tremblay’s reply was, “I checked with Dr. Gemmill about whether we would be changing our practice and releasing the data by community as you requested and his response was no.”
“He said he was asked a direct question during the media session and he responded with a truthful answer but it is not his intention that we change our practice in relation to the way we provide information until we receive further direction from the Information and Privacy Commission of Ontario (IPC).”
Why not?
The barn door is open – the cat is out of the bag. What the community has waited for, for literally months was just released freely. There is no need to withhold any other information.
Again, transparency equals trust.
Could there be repercussions with Dr. Gemmill releasing the information before the decision of the Information and Privacy Commission of Ontario?
Time will tell.
But once the information from several municipalities in Northumberland County has been released concerning COVID numbers, there is no turning back and frankly, no need to wait for the decision by the Privacy Commission.
To view the press conference click here
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
