COVID-19 and the Labour of Care
- COVID-19 and the Labour of Care
THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC HAS CERTAINLY CONNECTED EVERYONE to the history of disease. There have been many comparisons made with the "great influenza" of 1918 as well as other 20th-century pandemics.1 Early edited collections documented the impact of the pandemic in Manitoba and in Prince Edward Island, research projects were funded, and discussion groups created – notably "Mon récit covid," which is administered by a leading scholar of nursing history at the University of Ottawa Marie-Claude Thifault.2 Esyllt Jones has written exemplary, historically informed work to reach physicians, editorials for the general public, and two short reports for the Royal Society of Canada in the past year.3 Jones's previous work as an historian of epidemic disease was already well-known because of her excellent analysis of the impact of influenza on Winnipeg's working class. She wryly observed in Influenza 1918 that it was entirely possible to read histories of the Winnipeg General Strike and "have no idea … [that] working people were simultaneously confronting a [End Page 96] devasting disease."4 The lasting contribution of her book is that it transcended some of the silos of Canadian history and provided an analysis that integrated social history, community history, medical history, labour history, and other subdisciplines. It continues to stand as a model for how to connect the history of health and medicine to other analytical paths, including the history of working people.
COVID-19 laid bare some of the challenges facing Canada's health care system and especially staffing issues in long-term care. In Nova Scotia COVID-19 settled into Northwood, the largest long-term care (LTC) facility in the Atlantic region, which experienced the full brunt of COVID-19 during the early days of the pandemic. On 12 March 2020 Northwood imposed restrictions on visitors, including volunteers, and on 15 March Nova Scotia announced its first three cases of COVID-19 and immediately closed LTC facilities to all visitors. By the time the province declared a state of emergency and closed many businesses and restricted social gatherings, Northwood had become the epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic in Nova Scotia. In response, the facility created a "COVID Unit" to isolate people who had tested positive and take them out of the rooms they shared with other residents. One such story illustrates what was happening. Gerald Jackson, an 84-year-old resident, tested positive with COVID-19; the 21-year naval veteran shared his room with two other men, separated only by the flimsy curtain that offers residents a minimal form of privacy in the crowded rooms. Jackson died on 28 April 2020, one of 53 residents of Northwood who would succumb to COVID-19. His daughter, Darlene Metzler, described the triple room where he spent his final days: "This was like a hospital room. I challenge somebody to walk in that room at tell me that it doesn't look like institutional living where seniors are being warehoused."5
Northwood was hardly unique, and COVID-19 took hold in nursing homes throughout North America. By 20 April 2020 COVID-19 accounted for more than 7,000 nursing home deaths. In states such as New Jersey, nursing homes accounted for 40 per cent of the total deaths.6 It is a truism in the history of [End Page 97] public health that the burden disease is not shared equitably, and COVID-19 quickly revealed that elders, the poor, racialized communities, and the economically marginal were especially vulnerable. Nursing homes in Atlantic Canada braced for the impact of COVID-19.7 Tucker Hall, a licensed long-term care facility in Saint John, reported its first cases among residents and staff in November 2020. Cases mounted over the next few weeks, and affected residents were gathered together in a "cohorting area" where they could be cared for by the staff. The facility also worked with the New Brunswick Provincial Rapid Management Team and other government agencies to prepare a response to COVID-19 in the nursing home. By early January, 13 residents and 8 staff were infected at Tucker Hall. Shannex, the corporation that...
