Prince Rupert orders anyone entering city to self-isolate for 14 days

The City of Prince Rupert, B.C. has ordered anyone entering the community to undergo a mandatory 14-day self-isolation in order to stop the spread of COVID-19.

The order applies to residents who visit neighbouring communities and all travellers, whether foreign or domestic, with exceptions for essential workers, including delivery truck drivers and people involved in operations at the Port of Prince Rupert.

The order comes less than 24 hours after the city declared a local state of emergency in a push for far more stringent rules than those currently in place from the provincial or federal governments.

"This is an unprecedented time," said Mayor Lee Brain shortly after declaring a state of local emergency Monday night. "In a community that is on an island in the north, that has limited population and limited resources, one outbreak here could be devastating."

Watch: Prince Rupert's mayor outlines the need for stricter measures to fight COVID-19 in the north:

The city's emergency operations centre delivered the order, along with a set of rules applying to grocery stores which includes limiting entry and exit to one entrance, which will be required to have hand sanitizer and a greeter available to monitor lines.

Other measures proposed by the city, but not yet implemented, include a a shelter-in-place order for all residents and limiting in-person interactions to people who live together.

The City of Prince Rupert is leading several communities in northwestern B.C. in the push for far more aggressive measures than those seen elsewhere in the province.

Along with Prince Rupert, several other municipalities and First Nations along the North Coast and on Haida Gwaii have declared local states of emergency, as has the North Coast Regional District. The declarations are a co-ordinated effort that comes at the urging of a group of physicians worried the local health-care system isn't equipped to handle an outbreak.

"On a good day, this hospital, this place runs at capacity," said Dr. Johannes Piek, who works as a general anaesthetist at the Prince Rupert Regional Hospital. "We could very quickly run out of resources and it would be a disaster."

Piek is one of several doctors who penned open letters to political leaders in the northwest, urging a more aggressive approach to fighting the spread of COVID-19 in the region. One of the biggest concerns outlined was the lack of capacity locally to handle an outbreak.

Prince Rupert is in the Northern Health region, which at 600,000 square kilometres covers approximately two-thirds of the province. 

According to Health Minister Adrian Dix, Northern Health has a total of 116 ventilators and 571 acute care beds for the entire region and the province has repeatedly committed to ensuring local health-care providers have the resources they need.

But Piek worries about the vast geographic spread of those resources, with most in the Prince George area, more than 700 kilometres away.

Piek estimates Prince Rupert only has the capacity to put two or three people on incubators at a time and so until more equipment is actually in place he says the need to "flatten the curve" locally is a high priority.

"Ten people at the same time to ventilate, we can't," he said. "Ten people over three months, we can handle ... We need to try and keep people as healthy as possible so the infections happen in a more timely order."

That's why he was pleased when Prince Rupert council passed the state of emergency declaration and Mayor Brain endorsed some of the stricter recommendations floated in the physicians' letters.

Peck said he believes a "three month prison sentence" of strict isolation rules would be preferable to the deadly impacts the virus could have on the region.

"If you follow what's been happening in Italy, this could be the most dramatic time any of us ever experience," he said.

Under provincial legislation, a local state of emergency must be renewed every seven days. Brain said he expects Prince Rupert's to be in place for up to three months.

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