‘We’re pleading with them to hear us:’ Sask. unions want Shahab recommendations made into PHOs

Six of Saskatchewan’s unions came together Thursday to send a message to the province: Listen to Dr. Saqib Shahab’s advice.

The joint press conference included the heads of the Saskatchewan Teachers’ Federation (STF), Saskatchewan Federation of Labour (SFL), Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Saskatchewan Union of Nurses (SUN) and Saskatchewan Government and General Employees’ Union (SGEU). All six urged the Saskatchewan government to follow Shahab’s advice and implement previously recommended public health orders.

“At a news conference on Jan. 12, Dr. Shahab made strong recommendations in an effort to slow the community spread of COVID-19 and to protect vital services,” said SFL president Lori Johb.

Johb continued to outline the recommendations, which included limiting gathering sizes to 10, limiting gatherings in frequency and establishing consistent bubbles for residents, limiting non-school and non-work contacts and limiting essential travel between communities.

“We are asking for the government to listen and to implement these recommendations as public health orders before the situation gets any worse,” Johb continued.

The six union heads all detailed the struggles their workers are under, from the education system to the jail system, along with the health sector.

SUN president Tracy Zambory said roughly 1,000 health-care staff were sick last week, with both COVID and non-COVID illnesses.

The calls from the unions of Saskatchewan have fallen on deaf ears for the majority of the pandemic. When asked if the next step — should the province ignore the calls again — could include job action, it was said that workers are “dedicated and committed to go to work, every single day.”

“And they’ve shown that, in abundance, over the last two years,” Johb responded.

“I think that we have to recognize that it’s not the working people that have put us here. This is not the responsibility of the workers in our province, this is the responsibility of our provincial government — and we’re pleading with them to hear us.”

The unions said this is a call for the public to contact their MLAs and ask “What is going on here?”

“This is what we need to see happen. This is a call to action for all of us,” Zambory said.

“Call Premier Moe, call (Health) Minister (Paul) Merriman, call the SHA and ask, ‘What is the plan moving forward here?’ and ‘What are we going to do to protect our health-care system? To protect our health-care workers? To protect our teachers and our most valuable asset: our children?’ ”

Zambory fears the 1,000 workers who didn’t come into work last week will increase this week, with perhaps up to 2,000 people staying home from work. She adds many more health-care workers are looking into early retirement, or retiring due to the current strain on the health-care system.

During the press conference, unions cited the “leaked” modelling for Omicron conducted by the provincial government.

OK. #SK COVID-19 mega-thread.

NEW #SK Omicron models (via @DennisKendel) Jan 19:

– Measures implemented to SIGNIFICANTLY reduce social mixing, MAYBE we avoid disaster/triage in #SK hospitals.

– Do NOTHING, #SK hospitals crushed, triage ensues.

Get comfy – here we go.

(1/25) pic.twitter.com/27L9HcqNHd

— Dr. Alexander Wong (@awong37) January 20, 2022

The information — originally shared by Dr. Dennis Kendel, a former Saskatchewan Medical Association president — outlines that in the best-case scenario, Saskatchewan would be looking at around 500 hospitalizations by late January.

Saskatchewan has had 105,072 total reported cases of COVID-19 since March 2020. Saskatchewan’s seven-day average for cases has never been higher, with 1,269.

These numbers are not reflective of Saskatchewan’s total COVID caseload, either. Only PCR tests and reported rapid tests are put into the daily caseloads.