B.C.’s top doctor says an increase in COVID-19 cases in the province has made it riskier to allow expanded long term care visits.

However, Dr. Bonnie Henry says the goal continues to be ensure that safe visits can keep taking place so that long term care residents are not completely isolated.

“The focus on being able to safety visit in long term care is why we are immunizing both healthcare workers and people as soon as we can because that is really going to make the difference in protecting them and making sure that we can have those real visits with out family in a safe way as soon as we possibly can,” she said.

“What we are trying to do is make sure that we maintain those safe visits that have been in place over the last few months.”

In-person visits at care homes were restricted in March at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, since the end of June the province began to allow a designated visitor into care homes. Henry says the restrictions were put in place as once the virus gets into a facility it can be devastating.

Henry made those comments when asked about the BC Civil Association arguing that care home restrictions are violating the constitutional rights of seniors.

The BCCLA says as individual care homes are taking drastically different approaches to following the restrictions – including who is allowed to visit seniors and how often – that is affecting the mental and physical health of seniors.

“We’ve been quite clear on what an essential visitor is and recognize the importance of essential visitors and have been working to ensure that those guidance are applied appropriately and consistently,” Henry said, noting the current policy can be appeal if families are concerned about access to their loved ones.

BC Seniors Advocate Isobel Mackenzie too is calling for long-term care residents to have more access to visitors saying there is evidence that the restrictions are having a negative impact on residents’ health.

“We want to make sure that those requirements around essential visits are implemented in a way that is consistent around the province because what we were hearing was people were not being allowed to be designated as an essential visitor and many of them were absolutely were,” Henry added.

“So that was our focus over the last little while.”

According to the B.C. Centre for Disease Control, 496 of B.C.’s 678 total deaths as of Dec. 12 (73 per cent) were associated with long-term care outbreaks, while 606 (89 per cent) of the deaths were people over the age of 70.