On January 18 we initiated a weekly ELCC survey to track illness, isolation, and facility/cohort closures through the omicron wave. We ask interested facilities to fill out this survey each week between Tuesday and Thursday. Our surveys are open to responses from centres and home daycares, licensed and unlicensed facilities. To try and avoid duplicate entries please assign one person from a facility to fill it out. Please share this initiative widely within your network. Results will be posted here each Friday. Survey: https://forms.gle/PgSiN1S3UddAhEWY9
There is an acute need for government resources to be provided to Early Learning and Child Care (ELCC) programs to keep childcare workers and children safe during the COVID-19 pandemic. Every day childcare workers are asked to spend many hours with unvaccinated children, many of whom are unmasked and can not physically distance. Given the current widespread community infection rate of the omicron variant in Manitoba and around the world, childcare staff carry a heavy mental load with anxieties of interacting with potentially infectious children and the possibility of spreading infection to the children they provide care for and their families.
No government data is available for parents in Manitoba to make informed decisions about sending their children to childcare or to inform site level policies and project staffing. In an attempt to fill this gaping hole and obtain a snapshot of the state of COVID-19 infections in Mantioba's childcare sector, we are collecting data from facilities.
Our initial survey was open from January 6-January 13th. We asked questions about the COVID infections and isolations in children and staff, the resources that have been received from the province, the resources that are currently required, and an open-ended question that asked "Is there anything else you would like to tell us". We received 332 responses before conducting initial quantitative and qualitative analyses. We received an additional 30 responses before the survey was closed. Our initial report on these findings is below.
Contact information and more details about the research team is at the bottom.
Questions about our project or results, or requests from the media can be directed to Dr. Aleeza Gerstein.
Results
There is an acute need for government resources to be provided to Early Learning and Child Care (ELCC) programs to keep childcare workers and children safe during the COVID-19 pandemic. Every day childcare workers are asked to spend many hours with unvaccinated children, many of whom are unmasked and can not physically distance. Given the current widespread community infection rate of the omicron variant in Manitoba and around the world, childcare staff carry a heavy mental load with anxieties of interacting with potentially infectious children and the possibility of spreading infection to the children they provide care for and their families.
No government data is available for parents in Manitoba to make informed decisions about sending their children to childcare or to inform site level policies and project staffing. In an attempt to fill this gaping hole and obtain a snapshot of the state of COVID-19 infections in Mantioba's childcare sector, we are collecting data from facilities.
Our initial survey was open from January 6-January 13th. We asked questions about the COVID infections and isolations in children and staff, the resources that have been received from the province, the resources that are currently required, and an open-ended question that asked "Is there anything else you would like to tell us". We received 332 responses before conducting initial quantitative and qualitative analyses. We received an additional 30 responses before the survey was closed. Our initial report on these findings is below.
Contact information and more details about the research team is at the bottom.
Questions about our project or results, or requests from the media can be directed to Dr. Aleeza Gerstein.
Results
High level documents of weekly results from January 25-27:
| 210128-elccweeklyreport_week2.pdf |
High level documents of weekly results from January 18-20:
| 210121-elccweeklyreport.pdf |
High level document of initial finding, January 6-13:
| covid_in_elccmanitoba_jan13.pdf |
Infographics from initial findings:
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Representative press coverage:
The Manitoban, January 18, "Researchers Reveal COVID-19 Crisis In Child-Care Centres"
Winnipeg Free Press, Saturday January 15, "Daycares in dire situation, urgently need COVID help from province, NDP says"
CBC, Friday, January 14, "Daycare workers, parents call for more consideration as Omicron batters essential sector"
Radio-Canada, Tuesday January 13, "La petite enfance mise à l’épreuve par la vague Omicron"
Winnipeg Free Press, Saturday January 8, "Moms track daycare infections for parents"
Video
January 8, CTV
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January 8, City News
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January 12, Global News
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January 13, City News
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Who are we?
We are a team of six professors at the University of Manitoba that came together for this project:
Dr. Aleeza Gerstein
Assistant Professor, Departments of Microbiology & Statistics Departments at the University of Manitoba,
CIFAR Azrieli Global Scholar
Web: https://microstatslab.ca
Twitter: @acgerstein
Dr. Lauren Kelly
Assistant Professor, Departments of Pharmacology & Therapeutics and Community Health Sciences
Web: https://clinpharmlab.ca
Twitter: @PharmaLauren
Dr. Alicia Nijdam-Jones
Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychology
Web: https://ccfplab.ca/
Dr. Susan Prentice
Professor in the Department of Sociology
Duff Roblin Professor of Government
Web: http://umanitoba.ca/faculties/arts/departments/sociology/facstaff/prentice.html
Twitter: @SusanPrentice
Dr. Jennifer Protudjer
Assistant Professor, Department Pediatrics and Child Health
Endowed Research Chair in Allergy, Asthma and the Environment
Research Scientist, Children's Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba
Web: www.jenniferprotudjer.ca
Twitter: @jprotudjer
Dr. Souradet Shaw
Assistant Professor, Departments of Community Health Sciences & Medical Microbiology and Infectious Disesases
CRC in Program Science and Global Public Health (Tier II)
Web: https://umanitoba.ca/medicine/department-community-health-sciences/faculty-staff/profile-souradet-shaw
Twitter: @SouradetS
| csee-cba_rfp_childminding.pdf |