COVID-19 ripped through our lives leaving death and unforeseen disruptions in its wake but, for many, the ordeal now seems like a distant memory. Yet, it has only been six years since COVID-19 was first identified in China.
The scope of the COVID-19 pandemic was unprecedented. It resulted in millions of deaths worldwide and left some long-haul sufferers with debilitating ailments they continue to experience today. During enforced lockdowns we witnessed a mental health crisis as people dealt with feelings of anxiety, depression, loneliness. The isolation was also linked to an increase in substance abuse.
Aside from the devastating health consequences, the pandemic brought with it significant societal upheavals including remote work and learning, job loss, and economic fallout due to supply chain issues.
While no one was spared from the disruption and isolationism, it can be argued none suffered more than the residents of long-term care (LTC) homes. As a result, the class-action group at Gluckstein Lawyers is part of the coalition of law firms acting on behalf of residents, their families and visitors of the Responsive Group of privately owned long-term care homes in Ontario who contracted and/or had a family member contract COVID-19 during the pandemic.
The class-action lawsuit “seeks to hold the Responsive Group defendants accountable for alleged gross negligence in their preparation for and response to the COVID-19 pandemic in their LTC homes.”
LTC Homes ‘Disproportionately Impacted.’
While many of us sheltered safely in our family bubbles during the pandemic, LTC homes became epicenters for severe outbreaks. Between March 1, 2020, and August 15, 2021, more than 56,000 residents and 22,000 staff in Canada’s LTC and retirement homes were infected with the coronavirus, resulting in more than 14,000 deaths among staff and residents, according to the Canadian Institution for Health Information.
“Residents in Canada’s long-term care homes have been disproportionately impacted by COVID-19 infections and deaths,” the institute reported in December 2021. “While the pattern of infections among LTC residents mirrors the first three COVID-19 waves observed in the community, those in LTC experienced more COVID-19 deaths.”
But while thoughts of the pandemic were all consuming at the outset, people seemed to want to sweep it aside as the world slowly returned to some normalcy.
“After a mass trauma comes the mass forgetting. No one really wants to talk about COVID any more, even though it tore through every dimension of our lives,” the Guardian’s Brigid Delaney noted in June 2022. “But now it’s as if the disruption was so great, weird, terrible and abrupt, that we cannot incorporate it into our present and future narratives. And so we have done a remarkable and largely collective job of acting like the pandemic is over, and – even more – of trying to forget that it even happened.”
Still, as much as we would like to forget those dark, uncertain days, it is important to remember the lessons we learned from the pandemic.
Facilities Left Without Proper Oversight.
The CBC reported that the first wave of the pandemic overwhelmed Ontario's long-term care inspection system. According to the CBC, provincial ombudsman Paul Dubé revealed the ministry overseeing care homes was unprepared and unable to ensure the safety of residents and staff at LTC homes.
There were “no inspections in the province's long-term care homes for seven weeks in the spring of 2020, and no inspection reports issued for two months,” the CBC stated, leaving “facilities without proper oversight in a time where hundreds died in a matter of weeks.”
"To effectively oversee a system, you have to have inspections," Dubé said at a September 2023 news conference. "It was already strained before the pandemic, and it was not ready. The system wasn't there to enable inspections to happen in a safe and effective manner."
The ombudsman made 76 recommendations to the provincial government in his report that included regular training for inspectors.
‘An Out-Of-Body and Traumatic Experience.’
Based on public health records, more than 60,000 people have died from COVID-19 in Canada since the World Health Organization first declared a global pandemic on March 11, 2020. CBC reported earlier this year that family members of those lost to the virus still feel the pain.
"One thing that anyone who hasn't lost a loved one during the pandemic, one thing that they will never realize is what an out-of-body and traumatic experience that was," Simar Anand, whose father died of COVID-19, stated in the article. "I think the hardest part for me is watching how much the world has moved on around me, whereas I'm still stuck in March 2020."
Maureen Ambersley was a registered practical nurse at a Mississauga long-term care home who worked through the first year of the pandemic, “refusing to abandon her colleagues and patients,” according to the CBC.
She started showing symptoms of the virus in late December 2020 and was admitted to hospital where she was intubated. The 57-year-old died on Jan. 5, 2021.
"We weren't able to say goodbye or even be by her bedside," her daughter Ashley Ambersley said. "That eats us up every day."
Beyond the illnesses and death, the pandemic revealed systematic failures, underfunding and neglect. LTC homes faced supply issues and their residents were isolated and alone with families barred from visiting.
Slow to Establish Infection Control Practices.
The Royal Society of Canada (RSC) mandated a taskforce “to provide evidence-informed perspectives on major societal challenges in response to and recovery from COVID-19.” Noting “there is no doubt that we were unprepared for a global pandemic,” the RSC found “Canada and the provinces made mistakes.”
“We were slow to establish proper infection control practices and to provide personal protective equipment, we were unable to staff adequately, and we applied severe and cruel isolation practices, keeping those practices in place too long in many homes,” the Society found. “Older adults deteriorated and died as a result. Many died alone.”
As well, the study noted that LTC home staff worked short-handed and took on new and extra duties.
“Still, Canada has had successes. We did fix the gaps in infection control and personal protective equipment,” according to the RSC. “We bought vaccines, a lot of them, and we got them rapidly to the residents of LTC on a first priority basis. We stopped the hemorrhage, but not the affliction. Many jurisdictions came up with highly creative ways to integrate acute care and LTC.”
Seeking Justice for Those in LTC and Retirement Homes.
There is little doubt the pandemic exposed deep systemic issues within the LTC industry. It is imperative to avoid repeating past mistakes.
It is also important that those responsible for grossly negligent conduct be held accountable for their actions. And class-action lawsuits can be an effective vehicle to ensure access to justice.
The Ontario Superior Court of Justice certified seven class actions on behalf of thousands of residents and visitors of LTC homes who contracted COVID-19 during the pandemic. Gluckstein Lawyers took over carriage of the class action brought against the Responsive Group Homes.
It is alleged that the operators of these homes were grossly negligent in preparing for a pandemic and that they failed to take the steps necessary to protect residents and visitors from harm.
The certified class actions include residents of more than 200 long-term care homes owned and managed by Chartwell, Extendicare, Responsive Group, Revera, Schlegel Villages, Sienna Senior Living, and their affiliates.
The class action was brought on behalf of all those living in the LTC homes from Jan, 10, 2020 to the end of the COVID-19 pandemic (the Pandemic Period); the estates of all who died while living in the homes during the Pandemic Period; and the family members of all such individuals.
In the certification decision, Justice E.M. Morgan stated the pandemic was "a time of tragedy in Ontario's LTC homes." The decision highlights that more than 4,000 residents died and that LTC homes represented approximately 80 per cent of Canada's COVID-19 fatalities during the pandemic’s initial wave.
The Court determined that legislation enacted in 2020 by the Ontario government to shield businesses from liability for COVID-19 transmission does not apply to gross negligence and does not bar these lawsuits.
The defendants have denied these allegations and the Court has yet to rule on the merits of the class actions. To learn more about the class action, click here.