Grey Bruce's Medical Officer of Health has ordered all municipally-managed beaches in Grey and Bruce counties closed.
A statement from the Grey Bruce Health Unit says the order remains in effect until rescinded.
Dr. Ian Arra says this is a reasonable deterrent to discourage people from unnecessary travel locally or inter-provincially.
“This is very consistent with the direction from the Ministry,” Arra explains. “The Ministry issued re-opening of (provincial parks), but their beaches remained closed for good reason.”
Arra says he consulted with various stakeholders, including municipal leaders, chiefs of police and fire and county administration. He says the order to close beaches comes as he heard increased concern from municipal leaders about what's going to happen during the tourism season when it starts.
The region's medical officer of health says Grey Bruce has about 166,000 residents in the winter, while in the summer more than 2-million visitors flock to the area.
“With this mind, I look at the coming weeks and say: 'how can we manage to keep the relatively positive numbers we have?'” Arra wonders.
Grey Bruce has had zero deaths attributed to COVID-19 through the course of the pandemic.
Arra says it's really difficult to say how long the closure order will stand. He does note it's “not going to be for months”, but for a period of time that allows public health to see the impact of the first stage of re-opening businesses.
Prior to the order, beach closures and restrictions in Grey Bruce varied by municipality. The largest tourist beach, Sauble, was already closed. Some areas like Kincardine had been permitting limited access for exercise.
The order by Dr. Arra is being done through authority under section 22 of The Health Protection and Promotion Act. It grants broad powers to medical officers of health to issue orders that may require a person to take or to refrain from taking any action that is specified in respect of a communicable disease.
Municipalities will likely use local police or bylaw officers to enforce the beach closure order. Those entering closed municipal property can be charged under the Trespass To Property Act.
“However, the goal is to have most of the public doing the right thing because they're aware of it,” Arra notes.