Slowly but surely, Québec is reopening its economy
This afternoon, Québec’s Premier François Legault announced that five new regions will move from "red" status to "orange" status from March 8. As the number of daily cases and hospitalisations run lower, government estimates it can allow itself to keep reopening its economy and reduce restrictions on people and businesses.
Regions moving from "red" to "orange" will be:
Québec City and its surroundings (Capitale Nationale region)
Chaudière-Appalaches
Eastern Townships
Mauricie
Center of Québec
The curfew cut-off evening hour will move from 8pm to 9:30pm in these regions with a 9pm closure for shops and stores. Restaurants will be able to run albeit at limited capacity.
Montreal, Laval, Lanaudières, Laurentides and Montérégie will remain in "red" zones as heavier population density and accrued presence of variants would make formal reopening riskier for now. Roughly 60% of the province will thus remain at maximum alert level for the time being.
A complete map of the regions can be found here: https://www.quebec.ca/en/health/health-issues/a-z/2019-coronavirus/progressive-regional-alert-and-intervention-system/map-of-covid-19-alert-levels-by-region/#c77059
A complete list of "orange" zone restrictions can be found here: https://www.quebec.ca/en/health/health-issues/a-z/2019-coronavirus/progressive-regional-alert-and-intervention-system/level-3-alert-orange/
From March 15, extra-curriculum school activities will be able to start again and government hopes vaccination efforts will allow reopening more sectors over the next few weeks. We can nonetheless estimate that normal activities on the Island of Montreal and surrounding regions will take more time to come back.
Government also insists regions could move back to "red" status should the situation deteriorates.
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