The promise ” of a quiet Christmas “: It is by this understatement that the Quebec Premier François Legault terminated, Thursday, December 3, the” moral contract “offered a few days earlier to Quebecers on the subject of family or friendly reunions during the holiday season. In all the “red” zones where the epidemic is particularly virulent and where 91% of the population of Quebec live – only regions such as Gaspésie, the Laurentians or Abitibie-Témiscamingue among others are still in the “orange” zone or “Yellow” – each family will therefore have to be content with celebrating Christmas or the transition to the New Year between members living under the same roof.
On November 19, François Legault had nevertheless blown a wind of hope on all those who intended to share with grandparents and friends, the traditional turkey or the meat pie de rigueur during these festivities: he had announced that the gatherings ten people (maximum) would be allowed between December 24 and 27, before restricting to two the number of meetings allowed during this period, requiring everyone to observe a period of isolation, one week before and one week after the reunion. It was the “moral contract” that he proposed to pass with his fellow citizens, this call to the responsibility of each one to make it possible not to witness an explosion in the infection curve the day after the holidays. ” It’s a time to get together with your family, it’s not the Copacabana and the Rio festival that we’re asking you to do », Had warned in his usual flowery language Horacio Arruda, the director of public health.
The Prime Minister had accompanied this happy prospect of a codicil, passed a little unnoticed at the time: such gatherings would be authorized only ” if the infection curve was downward He warned, declaring that he would make a final decision on December 11.
Pessimism over the coming months
But the deterioration of the health situation pushed him to do an about-face and advance the announcement of this bad news. That same December 3, Quebec recorded 1,470 new cases of Covid-19, recorded 737 hospitalizations with 99 people in intensive care. In less than a month, the number of new infections in the province dropped from a plateau of a thousand new cases daily to approach 1,500 per day, for a total of 146,532 cases observed since the start of the pandemic .
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