SASKATOON — Opposition leader Ryan Meili says he is hoping the current provincial government will listen to suggestions and work more closely in order to live through the current COVID-19 pandemic, which now has the Omicron variant as the main concern.
The number of positive cases jumped by 15 per cent after the Christmas holidays with the active cases rising from 612 on Dec. 12 (30 days prior) to 8,229 Tuesday, based on the latest statistics provided by the Saskatchewan Health Authority.
Saskatoon and Regina had combined total cases of 42,638, 4,644 of which are currently active. Recoveries, however, are at 37,599 for both cities with 395 deaths. The number of those who recovered from the virus has yet to be reported to Public Health.
“I would love to see us [NDP and Sask. Party] work together on this instead of in opposition,” said Meili.
“On numerous occasions we've sent letters and spoken in the house about setting up a special committee — an all-party committee — that brings in leadership from all sectors: municipal leaders, like [La Loche mayor] Georgina [Jolibois], leaders in First Nations community and labour in business, come around the table with health care leadership and talk about the best response.”
Meili, however, accused the provincial government of doing the opposite thing.
“Instead, we've seen a political response from a government that wants to downplay, that wants to spin and put a happy face on what has been a terrible response,” said the MLA from Saskatoon Meewasin.
“A responsible grown-up mature response to this would be to bring everyone around the table and just be clear about the facts and do the best we can with everything we have. That's how we should be approaching that. It's really regrettable that those opportunities have been missed."
He added that getting the right information out is also not that easy.
“We don't have a direct line from the [Saskatchewan Health] Ministry or from [Chief Medical Officer] Dr. [Saqib] Shahab. On occasion, I will reach out. Early on the pandemic, they were giving us regular updates. We don’t get that [now],” said Meili.
“The reality is, sometimes people believe that because we’re elected, we have more access to information than the public. But the truth is, this government keeps that information to themselves.”
He added that sharing information about the pandemic needs to change.
“And this is what I think needs to change we need to see a much more transparent and open response, including full release of Dr. Shahab’s recommendations. Now, as well as during previous wave so we understand the choices this government made and why we saw things go as badly as we have.”
