Quebec scraps plan for new COVID rules in daycares after unions speak out

The Quebec government is backtracking on its plan to allow children and educators to continuing going to daycares after coming into a contact with someone who tested positive for COVID-19.

That plan, which was quietly put in place by the province last Thursday— the same day it announced a Quebec-wide overnight curfew — would have allowed children and daycare employees to keep showing up to their facilities despite coming into contact with a positive case of the coronavirus, as long as they did not show any symptoms.

The province received immediate pushback to the rule from daycare employees, as well as Montreal Public Health, which opted to suspend its application to child-care services on its territory.

Here are the new COVID-19 rules for daycares, according the province's association of CPEs:

• Children in daycare who come into contact with a positive case must now stay home for 10 days.
• Daycare workers who come into contact with a positive case must isolate for five days only, as long as they received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine.
• Daycare workers who test positive can return to work after isolating for five days, as long as there are no symptoms.
• Children in daycare who test positive must isolate for 10 days.

On Tuesday, the government also announced new isolation rules for the general population, which allow children under the age of 12 who test positive for COVID-19 to isolate for only five days.

However, that rule cannot be used to justify a child's return to daycare before the end of the 10-day isolation period.