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B.C. MP Marc Dalton has deleted a tweet asking whether it is time to start reopening businesses if most of the deaths from COVID-19 in this country are older people in long-term care homes.

In a tweet Monday morning, the Pitt Meadows–Maple Ridge representative said the average life expectancy in care homes is two years and that 65 per cent of residents usually die in the first year after moving in.

Then he questioned whether it is “time to start moving Canada back to work.”

The post was deleted shortly after The Canadian Press began inquiring about it.

Dalton’s tweet linked to a story from The Globe and Mail reporting positive signs that Canada is starting to flatten the curve in the COVID-19 pandemic, with the notable exception of outbreaks at long-term care facilities in Ontario and Quebec.

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Scott Duvall, the federal NDP’s critic for seniors’ issues, said Dalton’s tweet was heartless, disrespectful and unacceptable.

Dalton later sent a statement to Global News, offering condolences to those who have lost loved ones to the disease and sharing that his uncle, who is in a care home, has tested positive for it.

– with a file from Global News