Provincial Emergency Operations Centre takes command of COVID response in Sask.

While gathering sizes are being left up to individuals this holiday weekend, the Saskatchewan government is making some changes to how its response to the pandemic is being run.

The government is activating the Provincial Command through the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency’s Provincial Emergency Operations Centre (PEOC).

“This will ensure that the right resources are in the right place at the right time,” Premier Scott Moe explained at the announcement Thursday morning.

Starting Thursday, the PEOC will be responsible for the operational, planning, logistical and administrative aspects of the emergency response to COVID-19, including the management of staffing across the health-care system and co-ordination and deployment of provincial supports and activities.

Moe said the change will provide administrative and organizational support so that health-care workers can focus on providing health care instead of organizing vaccine clinics and testing efforts.

“This is a model that has worked extremely well in other emergency situations, responding to things like forest fires, floods (and) severe weather events,” Moe said.

“While COVID is obviously a very different kind of emergency for all of us, this is a structure that has worked very well in other emergencies we have experienced in Saskatchewan and we are confident that it will work well in supporting our response to COVID-19.”

The Provincial Command is to be led by a joint management team comprising Marlo Pritchard, the president of the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency, Saskatchewan Health Authority CEO Scott Livingstone, and Max Hendricks, the province’s deputy minister of health.

Moe said Saskatchewan chief medical health officer Dr. Saqib Shahab will still make recommendations and provide advice.

“The enhancement of the Provincial Emergency Operations Centre is not about taking over the response, it is designed to more effectively pull key individuals from the Saskatchewan Health Authority, Ministry of Health and their organizations together to better manage information flow,” said Pritchard.

He said the change will allow officials to gather, analyze and share information in a more timely manner, and will provide oversight from the “highest level of government” while using a joint management team to make decisions.

“We will be able to take off some of that strain, that administrative strain, that decision-making strain, from both Ministry of Health and SHA so they can redeploy if they’re suited. But again, it’s about that co-ordinated decision-making and being more timely,” said Pritchard.

However, neither Moe nor Pritchard could say at this point how many health-care workers the change could free up to do other work. Pritchard said they’re still assessing what is needed, so he’ll know better in about two weeks.

The Public Safety Agency has been helping out in different areas throughout the pandemic: Helping to set up regional responses, helping communities get things like PPE and moving nurses and equipment to northern areas when needed.

Provincial Command is expected to operate for the duration of the provincial emergency order, which was declared on Sept. 13.

NDP responds

NDP Leader Ryan Meili issued a statement after the news conference, saying Saskatchewan’s rising case numbers over the past two months could have been prevented if Moe had taken prompt action.

“This government clearly recognizes the need to bench Paul Merriman for his absolutely failed response to the pandemic,” Meili said, referring to the province’s health minister. “However, shifting responsibility for COVID-19 from one bureaucracy to another won’t do anything to add nurses and doctors to our overstretched ICUs.

“Scott Moe needed to ask for federal supports weeks ago and should have implemented evidence-based public health measures to protect Saskatchewan families this weekend. He should have announced this today.

“The people of Saskatchewan deserve so much better.”