Daycare workers, parents call for more consideration as Omicron batters essential sector

Not unlike schools, the daycare sector has pivoted multiple times during the pandemic, adopting new health and safety protocols and overhauling different operations.

However, the Omicron variant has thrown a significant wrench into the industry that cares for Canada's youngest, who don't always get as much attention as their school-aged peers.

Facing a "hyper-contagious" variant that's worsening pre-existing staff shortages as well as fast-changing isolation requirements and reduced access to COVID-19 PCR testing, daycare operators, staff and parents are sounding the alarm.

Montreal parent Diana Dacosta believes daycare is vital to Canada's workforce.

Though it was shuttered for a few months at the very start of the pandemic, the Montreal dental office where Dacosta works hasn't closed since. Her four-year-old daughter, Sofia, spends most of the day at daycare.

"If [daycare staff] weren't here for us … everyone would be at home," Dacosta said. "I think they're angels on Earth."

The daycare field has adjusted relatively well during previous waves of the pandemic, according to Montreal daycare owner and operator Mona Lisa Borrega.

"Now with this new variant, the Omicron, it's gone out of control. It's really complicated. It is hyper-contagious. I've never seen anything like this," she said. "If the whole daycare has to shut down [to isolate], where do the children of the essential workers go? That is the problem, and the way this virus is spreading, you don't see it coming."

The child-care sector requires support and more clarity when it comes to communication about the changing COVID-19 guidelines, said Borrega, who is also vice-president of a provincial private-daycare group, Association des garderies privées du Québec, and a member of a committee monitoring the overall daycare situation alongside public health officials.

Frequent changes to the rules — Quebec's isolation requirements for the sector, for instance, have shifted three times in the past two weeks — create chaos, sow confusion and erode the confidence of families, said Borrega. "They're mixing everybody up and it's very dangerous not to follow very, very clear guidelines."

Families have put their faith into child-care centres during the pandemic, she said, dropping their kids off even when they're no longer able to see what these youngsters experience inside.

But, she said, "parents have to feel confident while they're at work that their children are being taken care of and not to worry.… This is not the case anymore. People are very worried all the time."

Quickly shifting guidelines have also plagued Ontario's daycares.

Though Momentum Montessori has been thankfully spared of any positive COVID-19 cases thus far, families and staff are concerned about recent guideline amendments, said Natalie Edwards, principal of the Toronto centre.