This approach affects some 9,000 residents of 118 public retirement homes who suffered the full brunt of the effects of the first waves of the disease. A third of them died, sometimes in very degrading conditions, as evidenced by one of the plaintiffs who has been waging this legal battle which has lasted for four years.
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With our correspondent in Quebec, Pascale Guéricolas
Jean-Paul Daubois’ mother died in April 2020 in a public retirement home where a large part of the staff and residents had contracted Covid-19. “ The few employees who remained were running like crazy trying to provide care, even just giving water so people wouldn’t get dehydrated. No doctor, no device, no transfer to hospital, it’s a death sentence, that’s what it’s been like », says the son.
Four years after this tragedy, the sixty-year-old joined the collective action so that the government of Quebec examines its conscience. This action concerns residents and relatives of the 118 public retirement homes where 25% of cases of infection have been recorded. However, there were anti-pandemic measures, available from 2006, including protective measures and training for staff.
“ The government did not implement the plan it had adopted to deal with this type of threat. The actors in the system who had responsibilities and roles to take did not take them. We made improvised decisions, somewhat catastrophic decisions. This partly explains the significant massacre we experienced. »
Collective action should make it possible to point out the flaws in public retirement homes to prevent such a tragedy from happening again.