Health minister under fire again for trip to Ireland, not self-isolating upon return
'Why did you choose to go to Ireland in the midst of a growing health crisis?'
P.E.I. Health Minister James Aylward is once again under fire for his health recruitment trip to Ireland in March.
During Thursday's question period in the legislature, Opposition MLA Trish Altass said there were warnings of COVID-19 interfering with international travel from the World Health Organization in late February.
Altass also pointed out that several MLAs and Aylward himself attended a meeting with the province's Emergency Measures Organization in early March about being activated to Level 1 because of the virus.
She said despite those warnings and Ireland having cases at the time, Aylward made the trip anyway.
"Why did you choose to go to Ireland in the midst of a growing health crisis?" Altass asked.
Aylward 'chose to violate the self-isolation rules'
She also said that Aylward "chose to violate the self-isolation rules and make a couple of stops after Dr. Morrison told [him] to go directly home" following his trip.
Premier Dennis King previously confirmed that Aylward came into to the office the day he returned from his trip, March 13, and was told to go home by Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Heather Morrison because she planned to issue a directive later that day on the need for all those arriving in P.E.I. from outside the country to self-isolate for 14 days.
At a news briefing at noon on March 13, Morrison announced people returning to the province should self-isolate following international travel.
However, Aylward made two stops on his way home, including the grocery store.
Trip was approved by officials
In defence of his trip, Aylward said it had been approved by government and "if it wasn't felt that it was safe to do so, we wouldn't have received approval to do this travel."
"Times were changing," he said of mid-March. "It wasn't only changing on a weekly basis, a monthly basis, it was changing hourly so any warnings, any considerations around travel was taken into consideration."
As for his actions after meeting with Morrison, Aylward said "she alluded to, at that time, that 'you had some international travel. I would recommend that you probably go home. We are going to be having a detailed announcement later on this afternoon.' That was the extent of the conversation."