Doug Ford names five Toronto-area long-term-care homes that will get Armed Forces help

Five Toronto area long-term-care homes - including the Scarborough facility where a caregiver died of COVID-19 - will be the first to get help from military medical teams.

Premier Doug Ford's office announced Friday that Altamount Care Community in Scarborough, which was rocked by the death of personal support worker Christine Mandegarian, 54, last week, will receive aid from Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) personnel. Mandegarian had worked in the sector for 31 years.

Each of the 50-member military teams is headed by an army nurse. Both Ontario and Quebec are getting emergency armed forces help.

Also getting assistance are Orchard Villa in Pickering, Etobicoke's Eatonville, Hawthorne Place in North York, and Brampton's Holland Christian Homes' Grace Manor, Brampton.

The three nursing homes in Toronto have had almost 300 residents come down with COVID-19, according to the city's public health department. At Altamont, 28 residents have died, along with 86 residents and five staff infected since the outbreak began there March 25.

There have been 30 deaths of residents at Eatonville, where the virus began racing through on March 29 and has infected 156 residents and seven staff, and four residents hospitalized.

Hawthorne has had no deaths reported to date but 55 residents and seven staff have tested positive for the new coronavirus and two have been hospitalized since the first case was detected March 31.

At Holland Christian in Brampton there have been two deaths and 20 residents sent to hospital as 43 have tested positive for the virus, along with 21 workers self-isolating at home, creating a staff shortage as officials try to stop the spread.

Pickering's Orchard Villa, which has 233 beds, has seen 40 residents die with 131 testing positive. Another 66 staff have also contracted COVID-19.

"As conditions at long-term-care homes across the province continue to be monitored and tracked daily, CAF support may be redeployed to other sites, as required," Ivana Yelich, Ford's director of media relations said.

"Our top priority is ensuring the staff at these long-term care homes can focus on providing care and have the resources they need to combat the spread of this virus," said Yelich.

"We are asking everyone to respect the privacy of these long-term-care homes. At this time, it is critical the dedicated and hard-working staff in these homes operate in an environment free from outside distractions so they can focus on saving lives and delivering quality care to their residents," she said.

"We will continue to share more information as it is appropriate."

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who will confer with Ford and other premiers later Friday, said it may be time to consider whether long-term-care homes should be covered under the Canada Health Act.

Trudeau and Ford have both said the situation is unacceptable.

As of Friday, 573 nursing-home deaths now account for 75 per cent of Ontario's official tally of 763. On Thursday, long-ter-care homes had accounted for 70 per cent of coronavirus deaths.

On Thursday, Ford said he was grateful to Ottawa for the help.

"We have literally called in the troops and the cavalry is on its way," he said.

"We're in the process of working with the federal government as we speak. We're carefully assessing resources they make available to us and we will deploy those resources to where they're needed most."

Robert Benzie is the Star's Queen's Park bureau chief and a reporter covering Ontario politics. Follow him on Twitter: @robertbenzie

Robert Benzie is the Star's Queen's Park bureau chief and a reporter covering Ontario politics. Follow him on Twitter: @robertbenzie