How each province and territory has shaped Canada’s fight against the coronavirus

When it comes to preventing the spread of coronavirus, we're all in this together.

Yet, when it comes to Canada, each province and territory stands somewhat alone.

Each is grappling with its own combination of geography and travel patterns - and has responded with its own public health measures - all of which have shaped the spread of the virus.

While British Columbia was the first province to realize the deadly consequences of COVID-19, Quebec has emerged as the epicentre of the Canadian epidemic, with long-term care homes on the front lines.

Meanwhile, Nunavut, the only Canadian jurisdiction to be free of the coronavirus, is fighting to remain so, as the pressure the disease would exert on the territory's limited health-care resources has the potential to be catastrophic.

Every provincial government is struggling with how to balance the need to socially distance with the effect on the economy, and as the virus continues to spread this spring and into summer, the effects will be felt very differently in each corner of Canada.

Here's where things stand right now.

British Columbia

B.C. was the first province to confront the deadly consequences of COVID-19 - and has also been the first to show signs of slowing the virus's spread.

Long before the World Health Organization declared a global pandemic, the spectre of the coronavirus loomed over B.C. in the shape of neighbouring Washington state - the first jurisdiction in North America where the deadly virus was detected.

By the second week of March, cases of COVID-19 had not only crept up in B.C. at a rate surpassing the other provinces, but long-term care homes had become deadly epicentres for the province's fight against the virus just like they had in B.C.'s neighbour to the south.

The first coronavirus death in Canada was recorded at the Lynn Valley Care Centre in North Vancouver on March 9.

Due in part to the early detection of the coronavirus in B.C., the province was quick to implement widespread testing and containment strategies. Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said this week that the timing, paired with a bit of luck, have helped ensure that the more serious isolation and distancing rules that have been in place since the coronavirus was declared a global pandemic on March 12, have had a strong impact.

The daily number of new positive coronavirus tests in B.C. has gone down over the last week, with the result that officials are beginning to talk openly about a future of winding down distancing restrictions.

The hospitals, which usually operate at 100 per cent capacity or more, are currently operating below 60 per cent due to widespread cancellation of elective surgeries and reduced emergency visits.

But Henry warned that the province is still in it for the long haul, and that any easing of restrictions to come would not be a full return to normal.

Yukon

In Yukon's remote communities such as Old Crow in the far north, the consequences of overwhelming the health-care system with a pandemic would be nothing short of catastrophic. In the Arctic community of roughly 280 people there's only one nursing station and a doctor who flies in once every couple of months.

That's why, when a Quebec couple flew into Old Crow with the intention of hiding out from COVID-19, the reaction was outrage, and immediate expulsion of the couple.

With three hospitals, and a population of 35,874 people spread across almost 500,000 square kilometres, the Yukon government is taking few chances with the virus. Of 775 tests done there, seven have come back positive for the coronavirus.

On April 2, they implemented widespread travel restrictions, including a limitation that non-residents have to leave Yukon upon entry within 24 hours. It placed agents at borders and the Whitehorse airport to enforce the rules.

Yukon premier Sandy Silver made agreements with B.C. Premier John Horgan to transfer patients to British Columbia should the territory's system become overwhelmed. The territory also agreed to an open border with B.C. for the bordering communities of Atlin Fire Side, Pleasant Camp, Fraser and Jade City.

Alberta

A first look at Alberta's projections this week revealed cautious indicators that the province may be decently prepared - relatively speaking - for the coronavirus fight. But while modelling shows some progress in avoiding the worst case - many questions remain about what comes after.

Although it has the second highest rate per capita after Quebec, the province has tested aggressively and kept hospitalizations relatively low. Premier Jason Kenney has spoken optimistically about stores of protective gear for doctors, and has plans to ramp up hospital beds and ventilators.

According to modelling, a "probable" scenario will see between 400 and 3,100 Albertans die of the illness before the end of summer. It's a tragic number, but there are some early indications that social distancing measures put in place in March have already reduced the number of total infections.

But as serious as coronavirus is, Alberta is facing a battle on two fronts. The pandemic has brutalized economies around the world, but when coupled with a collapse in global oil prices, the effect on the petro-dependant province are likely to be longer and harsher.

"We cannot focus on either the pandemic or the economy. The two are intertwined," Kenney said in a televised address to Albertans on Tuesday.

The Alberta budget released a little over a month ago was based on an oil price of $58 per barrel, but a supply squabble between Saudi Arabia and Russia, combined with plunging demand because of coronavirus, has prices hovering at less than half that, a change that will cost Alberta billions.

Kenney's United Conservatives were elected on a plan to balance the budget, a mission that has continued during the pandemic. While Kenney has said the province will spare nothing on protecting the health of Albertans, they have drawn fire in some circles for continuing with cuts - including slashing funding for 25,000 education support workers - and adding to the ranks of the unemployed.

Notable given the current strain on health-care workers, many doctors in Alberta say that they're simultaneously preparing for coronavirus and contending with a government that isn't listening. In particular, forced changes to how they're paid that kicked in at the beginning of April have begun to fester - many doctors say they're now making less money, and some have closed clinics or reduced the services they offer, even as the pandemic rages.

In a public letter released Tuesday, Dr. Christine Molnar, head of the Alberta Medical Association, called coronavirus "the biggest challenge of our lifetime," but one that doctors in Alberta are facing "without the confidence that we are valued by our government."

"But we do not serve a government, we serve Albertans."

Nunavut

Nunavut is the only Canadian jurisdiction free of coronavirus cases.

Its government is not taking any chances while the pandemic is ongoing. Only residents and critical workers are allowed in, and they must self isolate for 14 days prior to entering the territory.

The stakes of coronavirus entering a community in Nunavut, where the population of almost 40,000 is spread across a vast Arctic Archipelago, could be catastrophic. The territory has only one hospital with 35 beds. It's in the capital, Iqaluit.

Northwest Territories

With five confirmed cases of COVID-19, Northwest Territories have implemented some of the most stringent isolation requirements among Canadian jurisdictions.

After a public health emergency was declared in the territory on March 18, all travel to the area was banned, including travel from elsewhere in Canada.

Residents are still allowed back into the territory, but they are required to self-isolate for 14 days in one of four regional centres upon their return, to avoid a situation where a truly isolated community is hit by the virus.

Saskatchewan

Although Saskatchewan remains slightly behind its western Prairie neighbour Alberta in terms of coronavirus spread, government projections show the province could see just as many deaths by the end of the pandemic.

Government projects released Wednesday predict that 3,000 to 8,300 people could die in the province from COVID-19. That's about the same - or slightly more than Alberta - despite Saskatchewan having about one quarter the population.

But spread has been slower in Saskatchewan, one of the least densely populated places in southern Canada. The province's total count is still shy of 300, compared to almost 1,500 cases in Alberta.

"We are luckily right now at the beginning. It's staying flat for now and we remain cautiously optimistic that this is what we hope to see continue," chief health officer Dr. Susan Shaw said. "However, we have a responsibility to be planning for what ifs."

Representatives for Indigenous communities have pointed out that existing issues on some First Nations, like overcrowding or a lack of health resources, compound the challenge posed by coronavirus.

Northern Saskatchewan is predominantly Indigenous, and according to Global News, the health authority for northern First Nations there is concerned that front line workers are not equipped to deal with the pandemic.

The Northern Inter-Tribal Health Authority said a February order for personal protective equipment had only been partially filled, and it had asked both the federal and provincial governments for more.

The authority's board chair said she recognizes the global shortage of things like masks and gloves, but was concerned the province hadn't reached out to ask First Nations about their needs following the federal government's response package.

"The impact of this disease would be devastating and we are asking for clear communication from the provincial and federal governments that our populations in our member communities will not be left out of the process when it comes to the amount of PPE needed in northern Saskatchewan," Chief Carolyn Bernard told Global.

Manitoba

Despite having just over 200 confirmed cases of coronavirus as of this week, and three deaths, fear about the COVID-19 pandemic in Manitoba is high.

Part of that is because officials believe there has been community spread of the virus in Winnipeg, meaning that the numbers could increase.

The nurses' union in Manitoba has been vocal on the issue of how best to protect workers who may come into contact with the virus - especially since three hospital workers became infected in March.

The nurses want all health care workers to have access to N95 respirator masks, which provide more protection than surgical masks.

Ontario

Ontario has come a long, tragic way since January 25, when the province's first confirmed case of the novel coronavirus was a traveller who had returned to Toronto aboard a China Southern Airlines flight.

The illness wasn't even named COVID-19 at that point, but has since become household parlance in a province that is largely shut down with confirmed cases doubling in the last week to more than 6,000 with over 200 deaths.

School closures were announced March 12 for three weeks and later extended to early May, but many parents are doubtful that kids will be back in class even then.

And as the March school break was about to begin, chief medical officer Dr. David Williams abruptly urged Ontarians not to leave the province on trips that had been booked for weeks and months.

While many stayed away and enjoyed their holidays, some interrupted their sunny vacations and came back after a couple of days to go into precautionary self-isolation at home, awaiting any possible symptoms.

With two-thirds of the known COVID-19 cases in the densely populated and often gridlocked Greater Toronto Area, the commuter GO Train service has dramatically cut back and streetcars often run along the streets empty as thousands work from home. Traffic is light.

Almost half the deaths have been in long-term care homes, the hardest-hit being the Pinecrest Nursing Home a 90-minute drive northeast of Toronto in the cottage country town of Bobcaygeon. That home has lost at least 28 residents to the virus and more than two dozen staff have become infected.

Premier Doug Ford has been scrambling, like other provincial and federal leaders, to secure new supplies of masks, face shields and other personal protective equipment for doctors, nurses and other health-care workers.

He sounded off over the lack of testing in Canada's most populous province, ordering officials to check more of the elderly, health-care workers, first responders and others at high risk to get a better handle on how fast the highly contagious virus is spreading.

"My patience has worn thin," he said bluntly this week, noting less than one-third of the province's lab testing capacity was being used daily in recent days.

"I'm going to be on this like a dog on a bone."

By Thursday, Ford acknowledged he was simply "frustrated" that a highly industrialized nation can run out of so many essential things despite pandemic planning.

"Unfortunately, it takes a crisis to see where a lot of areas have been broken throughout government and in the private sector, too. You really see the systems that work and don't work."

Quebec

Quebec has emerged as the epicentre of the coronavirus in Canada.

The fight is gruesome, but it's not the hospitals that are bearing the brunt of the impact: It's long-term care homes.

On Wednesday, the province hit the grim milestone of 10,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19, and 175 total deaths from the disease.

More than half of the deaths were recorded in long-term care homes, facilities which have resulted in some of the deadliest coronavirus outbreaks across North America.

One long-term care residence north of Montreal, the Centre d'hebergement Sainte-Dorothi(C)e in Laval, was reporting more than 115 cases of COVID-19 and 13 deaths as of Wednesday afternoon, and the province was looking at ways to redeploy its hospital health-care staff to the hard struck care homes.

Part of the reason Quebec is seeing more coronavirus spread than other provinces may have to do with spring break.

While most provinces began a one or two week break for public schools on or after March 16, Quebec and New Brunswick both had their break a week earlier.

B.C. provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said this week that means that more people were leaving and returning to Quebec during the crucial period of time when the coronavirus was spreading and widespread travel restrictions were not yet in place.

Quebec Premier Franiois Legault said Wednesday that a silver lining may be on the way, with hospitalizations from COVID-19 appearing to stabilize in the province.

New Brunswick

Embarrassed by an initial round of shoddy data collection, the New Brunswick government had to reset at the beginning of April and take a second stab at collating their coronavirus test results.

Of its first round of 3,234 tests, one-sixth had missing location information, making tracking of the virus spread in the province problematic. The province also found that a disproportionate amount of its testing was done in the Moncton region.

Since that initial misstep, the province's database has been reinforced with location information from its assessment centres, and testing for the virus has been spread more evenly across the province.

With a more stringent set of testing criteria, New Brunswick's rate of testing has been proportionately lower than that of its neighbouring provinces. On Tuesday, chief medical officer of health Dr. Jennifer Russell for the first time expanded the criteria for testing to include people with coronavirus symptoms who had not travelled outside the province.

This came shortly after the province received a shipment of 5,000 testing kits from the federal government.

Even accounting for low levels of testing, however, New Brunswick's rate of infection has been relatively low. One in 58 tests in New Brunswick yields a positive result, as compared to Nova Scotia's rate of one in 35. The province's total now sits at 111, with no fatalities as of April 9.

That lower rate is attributed in part to a higher proportion of New Brunswick's population living in sparsely populated rural areas.

The epidemic has taken its toll on the province's fisheries, too. After being hit with rapidly falling prices for its lobster, fishermen in the Bay of Fundy asked the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to delay the opening of their lobster season for a month, from March 31 to April 30.

Prince Edward Island

The country's smallest province, predictably, has among the fewest cases of coronavirus with 25, as of April 9.

But it is also facing some bleak economic times ahead. Tourism, fishing and agriculture are the three biggest industries and at least the first two of those have taken a big hit from the coronavirus epidemic.

The province's recent economic outlook report for 2020 projects 20,200 job losses by May, representing about a quarter of P.E.I.'s workforce.

Most of those job losses will be in the Accommodation and Food Services sectors, which will bear the brunt of the loss of tourism, which represents 3 per cent of the Island's GDP.

The province has restricted the docking of cruise ships until July 2020, which will decrease the number of cruise ship visits by 17 per cent, according to the report.

The province will face a difficult decision about whether it will open the island to tourism after July 1, as it attempts to balance tourism income against the spread of the disease.

At the same time, the P.E.I. Fisherman's Association and its members are mulling over a decision about whether to postpone the spring lobster season due to begin on April 30. Although that debate is primarily over coronavirus safety issues, the fact is that the radically diminished market for lobster means a profitable lobster season seems unlikely.

The economic outlook report suggested that the agriculture sector - barring any weather-related issues - would not be overly affected by the pandemic, and would continue to contribute strongly to P.E.I.'s economy.

Nova Scotia

Nova Scotia reported its first coronavirus death on April 6, a woman in her 70s from Cape Breton with an underlying medical condition. A woman in her 90s, also in Cape Breton, became the second person in the province to die of the disease on April 8.

Nova Scotia was the first of the Atlantic Provinces to adopt many of the restrictions designed to slow the spread of the coronavirus, but that still hasn't stopped significant chunks of the population from ignoring social distancing protocols.

Parks Canada on Wednesday closed off the entire park area around Citadel Hill - site of the iconic Halifax Citadel National Historic site that overlooks downtown Halifax - in response to the number of people still using the grounds and not observing physical distancing recommendations. Parks had closed off the fort itself on March 25.

Two weeks ago, Nova Scotia chief medical officer Dr. Robert Strang closed the province's borders, ordering anyone coming from out-of-province to avoid public spaces and self-isolate immediately for 14 days. On Monday, in Amherst, N.S., police ticketed three New Brunswickers who had crossed the border and visited hardware and grocery stores. Those tickets came with a $1,000 fine.

The province has also been hit hard by lobster prices that have dropped precipitously since the coronavirus epidemic choked demand from China, once its biggest customer. Through the month of February, lobster prices fell by almost 50 per cent, causing some in the industry to call for a postponement to the season.

With the biggest population of the Atlantic Provinces, predictably, Nova Scotia also has the highest number of cases at 373, with two fatalities as of April 9, mostly clustered in the Nova Scotia Health Authority's Eastern zone, which includes Halifax.

The province expanded its list of symptoms that indicate screening for coronavirus Wednesday after determining that about 10 per cent of its cases were a result of community transmission.

Newfoundland and Labrador

In Newfoundland, police arrested the same woman twice in three days in late March for failing to abide by the province's coronavirus guidelines on self-isolation.

It was one extreme example but representative, in the minds of some, of what was initially a cavalier attitude among some in Canada's easternmost province toward the coronavirus and the health protocols it prompts.

On more than one occasion, both Premier Dwight Ball and Health Minister John Haggie have taken time during their daily briefings to berate those who weren't taking coronavirus restriction seriously.

That attitude may now have changed, as the province has watched the death tolls grow in other parts of the country - and as the impact has now been felt closer to home. The province reported 236 cases and 3 deaths as of April 9.

One outbreak traced to a single funeral home over a three-day period has resulted in 167 cases of the virus - including the first death - as well as an outright ban on funerals. It's been dubbed the Caul's cluster, after the Caul's Funeral Home in St. John's, where it originated.

The COVID-19 crisis has also presented an economic threat in Newfoundland, leading the premier to write an alarming letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last month that the province was on the verge of being unable to pay its employees.

In response, the federal government made a commitment to buy short-term bonds from the provinces, staving off fiscal disaster for the moment.

One of the factors in Newfoundland's financial imbalance is that 21 per cent of its population is aged 65 or older, and of these, 84 per cent have at least one chronic disease. In general, that indicates that Newfoundland's population will suffer greatly when the inevitable spike in coronavirus cases comes. And with an indeterminate end to the crisis, health care funding will be severely overstretched.

With files from The Canadian Press