Sent on behalf of Dr. Rhonda Crocker Ellacott, President & CEO and Dr. Peter Voros, COVID-19 Incident Manager

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In light of a predicted COVID-19 case surge and some parts of our province facing extreme pressure, the Ministry of Health has directed hospitals outside of Northern Ontario to begin ramping down all elective surgeries and non-emergent/non-urgent activities in order to preserve critical care and human resource capacity. This ramping down will begin on Monday. Again, for now at least, this does not apply to the North. We will keep you informed if there should be any change in this directive.

As well, the Ministry has advised all hospitals that it may request available health care workers/teams to support care in other parts of Ontario by being redeployed to overburdened sites. We have been tasked with identifying available staff for redeployment. We are proceeding under the assumption it will be voluntary until told otherwise. Your department leads may be in touch to start identifying who may be willing to consider redeployment to help other regions in need.

We understand fully that this may cause you some stress and anxiety. With vaccinations rolling out, there is light at the end of the tunnel for us during this pandemic. And, although we may find these government directives challenging, it is crucial to remember that we are part of a province-wide health care system that supports each other in times of need. Sometimes we are on the receiving end of that help and sometimes we have to step up and be the support system for others. This is one of those times.

We can appreciate you may have many questions as do we. This is all moving quickly and we will keep you updated as new information becomes available. Thank you, everyone, for your continued hard work and compassion in helping our communities get through this third (and hopefully final) COVID wave.

All Hospital COVID-19 updates are also available on the iNtranet at https://comms.tbrhsc.net/covid-19-information/