Speaking from Montreal on Thursday afternoon, Quebec Premier Francois Legault announced that elementary schools and daycares in the city will not be reopening on May 25 as previously announced because the necessary conditions have not been met.
“When we look at the situation as a whole, it remains pretty fragile in Montreal,” Legault said, explaining that with the amount of the school year that remains, the decision has been made to keep schools in the Greater Montreal region closed until the end of August or beginning of September. Daycares, meanwhile, have had their reopening postponed to June 1, on the condition that the situation improves by that time.
“If we can open them in June we will do so,” the premier said.
As to the planned reopening of businesses, Legault said that the plan is still to look to doing so on May 25, but that this goal is more likely to be reached if people in the city adopt the wearing of masks more broadly.
“Health has to come first,” he said.
As of Thursday the INSPQ, Quebec’s institute of public health, was reporting 40,724 confirmed cases of COVID 19 in the province, up 793 from the day before. The public health authority in the Eastern Townships, meanwhile, recorded a total of 902 confirmed cases in the region, an increase of one from the previous day. The INSPQ also reported 1,834 hospitalizations on Thursday, 190 of which were in intensive care. Both of these figures represent a decrease from the previous report. There are currently 10,829 cases of people who were known to have infections who have recovered, 656 of whom are in the Estrie Region.
