The MHA for Torngat Mountains wants answers as to why COVID rapid test kits have not been supplied to travellers entering Labrador. The health minister is looking into it.
Lela Evans has written the Health Minister after receiving a complain from a resident about a recent flight that brought passengers back to the province from all across the country. Evans says those who disembarked in St. John’s were given rapid test kits, while Labrador passengers on the exact same flight “received nothing.”
Evans tells the minister that Labrador does not have the medical resources or an ICU to be able to respond to a large scale COVID-19 outbreak.
The coast of Labrador is especially vulnerable says Evans because of its reliance on good weather in order to medivac patients. Nain in particular is completely reliant on daylight hours for medivacs because the local airstrip does not have lights.
She is urging the minister to close the gap in resources for Labrador.
Meanwhile, Health Minister John Haggie responded to the issues raised by Evans during Wednesday’s COVID briefing.
He says anyone going into Labrador should be receiving test kits. He says those concerns haven’t been posed to him before, but they will look at it and if there are loopholes in the system he will make sure they are closed.
