Quebec Gathering Rules Are Going To Ease Up Slightly On Monday

In a press conference on Tuesday, January 25, Premier François Legault announced a series of what he called "small" rule relaxations that will take effect on Monday, January 31, including a loosening of Quebec gathering restrictions.

Banned since late December, private gatherings will as of that date be able to consist of either two household bubbles or a maximum of four people from multiple different households.

A similar rule will apply to restaurant dining rooms, which will also reopen on January 31. Restaurants will be able to reopen at 50% capacity, but table parties will be limited to a maximum of four people or the residents of two different bubbles, Legault said.

The premier emphasized that given the falling but still high total number of COVID-19 hospitalizations, reopenings are going to roll out gradually.

"If you were to have one word to hold on to today, it's the word mollo" — as in "easy does it" in English.

Quebec reported 272 hospital admissions and 293 releases on January 25, for a net drop of 21 and a total of 3,278 hospital beds occupied by COVID-19 patients.

Since the January 20 COVID-19 report, the number of hospitalizations in the province has slowly fallen after a record-breaking climb in the first half of January.

The latest projections from the Institut national d'excellence en santé et en services sociaux (INESSS), released on January 20, suggest that daily hospital intakes could drop to around 200 by the end of the first week in February while the number of total hospitalizations falls to around 3,000.