Behind the COVID curtain: formerly confidential Alberta government documents made public

COVID-19 restrictions in February.The documents — which were previously marked confidential — were ordered by provincial court to be turned over by one of the authors, along with the health department and chief medical officer of health Dr.

Deena Hinshaw, after the parents of five immunocompromised kids and the Alberta Federation of Labour sued the UCP government over the decision to lift the mask mandate in February.Premier Jason Kenney announced on Feb.

8 that the province would be lifting the vaccine passport system, and only five days later, end the school mask mandate.The decision was made shortly after the UCP COVID cabinet committee met and weighed options presented by Health Minister Jason Copping on how to move forward as Alberta transitioned out of the pandemic phase of COVID-19 and into the transition phase.The third and final phase is the endemic phase.

Challenge on lifting mask mandate in Alberta schools denied by court The document states that Alberta would be leading the way into the endemic phase with a “gradual removal of public health measures” to decrease risk.However, the document warns that “lifting restrictions should begin only once pressures on the health-care system have sufficiently eased and are likely to continue easing.”From my perspective, it clearly shows that their eyes were focused clearly on politics, especially their narrow self-interest and politics, and not where it should have been, which is on public safety, especially for our kids,” said Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour.As requested by the provincial government, Hinshaw provided recommendations for going forward with lifting all restrictions, which included ramping up the capacity of the health-care.