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Manitoulin Centennial Manor dodges COVID-19 lawsuit fishing trip

LITTLE CURRENT—Manitoulin Centennial Manor weathered the pandemic storm in a manner that left many larger long-term care homes envious, losing no residents to the COVID virus and managing to limit outbreaks that did occur (only one outbreak lasted three weeks).

Thanks to the hard work and diligence of the Manor staff in maintaining safe practices throughout the pandemic years the Manor was able to make the case for not being included in the class action suit being aimed at those nursing homes whose horror stories dominated the news cycle—but that hasn’t stopped legal teams from trying.

During the January 23 Manor board meeting, administrator Don Cook informed the board that the home had received a communication from their lawyers that a demand from the class action lawyers that the Manor provide them with a raft of information.

“We had been successful in not being included in the class action suit,” said Mr. Cook. “The lawyers were asking for data covering January 2020 to 2023. That was quite a bit of information and I suspect they were looking to pick through the data to find some other way to include us in that suit.”

The Manor’s lawyers were able to shut down that request, pointing out that the amount of effort and labour time it would have taken to harvest all of the data requested would have been onerous and expensive, taking away from the resources needed to look after Manor residents.

“Our lawyers were successful,” said Mr. Cook. 

The administrator noted that, should anyone wish to enter the class action lawsuit, “to jump onboard” would need to go through Extendicare, the management company that assists the Manor in operating the home. That would require the plaintiff to be a resident or family member of a resident in order to do so. They would have to do so within 30 days of the suit being certified.

Six of Ontario’s largest for-profit long term care homes currently face class action lawsuits for alleged gross negligence during pandemic. The companies are accused of inadequate care that resulted in avoidable COVID-19 deaths. Some 4,335 long-term care home residents passed away between March 2020 and April 2022 and the plaintiffs allege that at least 3,300 of those deaths were in long-term care homes owned and operated by the defendants. 

The lawsuit, which was a combination of eight proceedings, also names 304 independent and municipal long-term care homes—making up almost half of the long-term care facilities in Ontario. No Island long-term care home is included in the suit.

None of the allegations have been proven in court.

Article written by

Michael Erskine
Michael Erskine
Michael Erskine BA (Hons) is Associate Editor at The Manitoulin Expositor. He received his honours BA from Laurentian University in 1987. His former lives include underground miner, oil rig roughneck, early childhood educator, elementary school teacher, college professor and community legal worker. Michael has written several college course manuals and has won numerous Ontario Community Newspaper Awards in the rural, business and finance and editorial categories.