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Premier John Horgan and Health Minister Adrian Dix denied that the province is withholding COVID-19 data from the public even as public health officials promised to start releasing neighbourhood-specific information on infections and vaccinations starting this week.
During question period Monday, B.C. Liberal leader Shirley Bond said that only publishing a fraction of data collected by the B.C. Centre for Disease Control is “disrespectful and harmful” to communities hit hardest by the virus such as Whalley and Newton in northeastern Surrey. B.C. Green party leader Sonia Furstenau said the government is jeopardizing public trust by not providing them unfiltered COVID data.
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Workers who are sick with COVID-19 or need to quarantine while awaiting test results will get three days paid sick leave covered by the B.C. government, Premier John Horgan and Labour Minister Harry Bains announced Tuesday.
The measures were slammed by labour advocates and opposition leaders who say three days is not enough to ensure someone who is ill doesn’t go into work.
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The NDP government introduced a bill Monday that will allow the Electoral Boundaries Commission to redraw some of B.C.’s ridings to reflect a growing population in some areas.
The reforms, if passed, will likely increase the number of ridings in B.C., especially in densely populated urban areas where the NDP thrived in the October election, as the commission has the power to increase the number of seats from 87 to 93.
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Officials have vowed to provide more information on how COVID-19 is affecting specific neighbourhoods after criticism that B.C. is withholding crucial figures from the public.
Despite that, the provincial health officer defended the province’s release of figures, insisting officials release as much information as they can and denying that B.C. falls behind other provinces in terms of transparency.
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“We are releasing more than what other provinces are releasing,” Dr. Bonnie Henry said Friday, adding that every month she and Health Minister Adrian Dix present COVID-19 modelling information based on information compiled by the B.C. Centre for Disease Control. “We have been very open from the very beginning where we presented as much as we could by areas.”
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VICTORIA The past week has featured three tests of Premier John Horgan’s promise of openness and transparency and his NDP government failed all three.
The most telling example was the leak of two internal reports from the B.C. Centre for Disease Control, which showed the government has been assembling far more information about the COVID-19 outbreak than it made public.
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“The internal reports each over 45 pages are four times longer than the weekly reports published by the centre,” as Nathan Griffiths reported in The Vancouver Sun on Friday. “They delve into the details of COVID-19 case counts and vaccinations at the neighbourhood level, breakdowns about variants of concern, and more … a level of detail the centre has so far refused to make public despite repeated calls from a