Government Quarantines People with COVID-19 in Hotels
Disclaimer: The point of this post is to keep the idea more open-ended so that more people (government, hospitals, saving jobs, infected people, etc.) can benefit. If you do not think that this is a good idea, it would be preferred that we receive alternative ideas to help the initiative!
Right off the bat, quarantining people in hotels is not currently happening in Canada. However, this news was reported by CTV (a Canadian network) a few days ago:
Other Places Around the World
The report went over my head at the time, until I saw a trend with other governments (Australia, Singapore) using hotels to quarantine people with COVID-19 to ease hospitals.
- Overseas arrivals to Australia to be quarantined in hotels for two weeks over coronavirus
- In Singapore, Quarantine Comes With a Sea View and Room Service
- San Francisco signs leases for 300 hotel rooms for COVID-19 quarantine patients, vulnerable people
It got me thinking that maybe this is something that the Canadian government or provincial governments should look into?
Currently in Canada
Right now, in Canada, the Hotel Association of Canada is “monitoring developments around COVID-19 closely and is working in partnership with Public Health to bring you the latest developments.”
Is this a good idea?
It might seem odd at first and the hotels will need to make adjustments but there are several benefits to this idea:
- Free up hospital resources: I feel the most strongly about this benefit because there are constant fears that hospitals may get overwhelmed.
- Keeping hotels running: by giving hotels some cash flow and helping the overall economy
- Keep more jobs: this means that hotel workers get to keep their jobs
- … Will add more based on comment section below
To make this work, governments would need to work out a deal with hotels. Doctors would need to determine who qualifies to stay at a hotel instead of staying in the hospital to recover. But if they are going to be sent home anyway, the would not qualify. Maybe this should only apply to someone coming home (from another country) and risk infecting people already in their home. In San Francisco (from the article mentioned above): “Stay-at-home orders are in place to stop the coronavirus transmission but many people on medical quarantine, first responders, single room occupancy residents and the homeless need a place to stay.”
Whatever the criteria, the goal is for the government to re-allocate resources more efficiently, as hotels have the ability to help with quarantines to free up space in hospitals. As we get more positive feed back in the comment section below, I can add to the list of benefits mentioned above. The reason is because I want to use this list and share it with decision makers (please see below).
Let’s Go for 100 Positive Comments
One of our readers, J, challenged me yesterday:
I’m not sure about a petition to the CTA yet, but it did inspire me to do this one.
Since my one voice is probably going to get drowned out, here’s what I am hoping. If we can get at least 100 positive comments, we will have more leverage to reach out to the Hotels Association of Canada. Furthermore, with 100 comments, feel free to share this post (or suggest it to us) with any government department, agency, etc. that you think would make a difference.
I know 100 positive comments sound ambitious, so we will need your help to spread the word. And maybe other countries will catch on too!
Please remember, the point of this post is to keep things open-ended so that more people (government, hospitals, saving jobs, infected people, etc.) can benefit from this. If you do not think that this is a good idea, alternative ideas are most welcomed! Either way, we will need as many positive comments as possible for this post to have any sort of weight. Let’s begin, please share your positive thoughts in the comment section below!