Reducing the risk of COVID-19 exposure appears to be much more important than the freedom to travel for Atlantic Canadians.
The vast majority of Atlantic Canadians - 79 per cent - have not ventured outside their home province since the Atlantic bubble was put in place on July 3, according to an online panel survey conducted by Narrative Research. The results of the survey were released Thursday.
Only two in 10 people surveyed, or 21 per cent, have either personally travelled, or had someone in their household travel, to another Atlantic province.
"I think that Atlantic Canadians in general have stayed close to home,” Narrative Research CEO Margaret Brigley said in an interview.
“They have not ventured outside of their home province since the Atlantic bubble was announced, and certainly within the last few months, they have not, very few, have travelled to other areas in the country.”
In fact, only three per cent of the roughly 3,300 people who took part in Narrative Research's "East Coast Voice" online panel have travelled outside Atlantic Canada.
Brigley said it’s likely a matter of protecting the comparatively safe environment that Atlantic Canadians have enjoyed compared to the rest of the country, and certainly places such as the United States, where there have been more than 5.1 million cases and over 163,000 deaths.
“We've all taken much action in the past five months," she said. "We have (ensured) social distancing is in place, remote working continues to be very standard for many. We've had personal bubbles, regional bubbles, mandatory mask-wearing in public places.”
The panellists for the most part welcomed the public health regulations and other actions governments have been put in place to combat COVID-19.
Nearly nine in 10 residents, or 87 per cent, report some degree of satisfaction with those actions, while only one in 10 expressed any level of dissatisfaction. Newfoundland and Labrador residents were slightly less likely to be satisfied (76 per cent) than other Atlantic Canadians.
“All of those efforts have clearly paid off and have put our region in really an enviable position and (we) feel safeguarded to a certain extent,” Brigley said.
As of Wednesday, Nova Scotia had reported no new COVID-19 cases for 10 days. The virus has killed 64 people in the province, with 53 of those deaths occurring at the Northwood nursing home in Halifax.
Until recently, COVID-19 had been dormant in Prince Edward Island, but its chief public health officer reported five new cases Wednesday, all essential workers who entered the province July 31.
New Brunswick also reported a new case Wednesday - there are eight active cases in that province - and Newfoundland and Labrador has two active cases.
While the stay-the-blazes-home theme was apparent across the region, there were slight differences among the provinces. For example, Prince Edward Islanders have been more migratory than their fellow Atlantic Canadians. About four in 10 had travelled off-island since the Atlantic bubble was put in place. At the other end of the spectrum, only one in 10 Newfoundland and Labrador residents reported leaving the Rock.
The Narrative Research panellists offered a much firmer consensus when it comes to opening up borders.
“There’s clear opposition to opening the Atlantic borders to the rest of Canada, removing the 14 -day quarantine, and there’s unanimous opposition to opening the U.S. border in the next month,” Brigley said.
Eighty-eight per cent of Atlantic Canadians "completely oppose" opening the U.S. border. In the "mostly oppose" category, those numbers rise to a high of 96 and 97 per cent in Nova Scotia and N.L. respectively.
The online survey was conducted from Aug. 5 to 9, with 3,373 Atlantic Canadians (N.B. 1,115, P.E.I. 220, N.S. 1,547 and N.L. 491). All were 18 years of age or older. Using data from the 2016 census, Narrative Research weighted the results by gender, age, and region to reflect population characteristics.
