At it’s annual general meeting, the BC Care Providers Association passed a resolution to ask the provincial government for legislation that would protect them from lawsuits stemming from COVID-19.

The BCCPA is the lobby group for private care providers in the province, and its CEO Terry Lake says they are not looking for blanket immunity.

“You know it would be subject to following all the rules, regulations, public health orders you know the standards of care that are in place,” he said on the NL Noon Report.

“We’re not looking for unlimited liability protection. The operators would obviously be held accountable for quality of care and following all of the rules, regulations and guidelines.”

Lake however says he thinks is someone were to contract coronavirus in long term care, the care homes should be protected from civil liability.

“To fight those civil suits requires time, it requires resources, and those precious resources of time and money need to be spent on the front lines,” he added.

Lake says care homes have temporary liability protection until the pandemic emergency is declared over – but after that – without government intervention – he worries the sector could be ravaged by lawsuits.

“Because otherwise what we’re going to find is operators simply not able to continue operating and that would throw our long term care sector into chaos and wait times of course would go through the roof and families would be scrambling to find places for their loved ones,” he added.

The majority of the COVID-19 deaths in the province have occurred in long term care.