There are new twists on the standard advice to “stay home if you can” to avoid spreading the highly contagious new coronavirus.

Premier Doug Ford sent warnings Friday to travellers returning from trips outside Canada and to city folk inclined to ride out the COVID-19 pandemic working remotely or chilling at their cottages.

Ford said he’s been getting a “tremendous” number of calls from municipal leaders and residents in cottage country concerned too many people are arriving and placing strains on supermarkets, stores and hospitals not equipped to handle the influx at this time of year.

“If you have a cottage, they’re just asking you, please, don’t come up to the cottage because of what’s happening,” the premier told reporters.

His remarks echoed appeals recently seen on social media from those who fear not only bare supermarket shelves but increased spread of the new coronavirus. Half of Ontario’s confirmed cases are from Toronto where the bug is now increasingly circulating in the community.

“The hospitals, they don’t have the capacity we do in urban settings,” added Ford, a Muskoka cottage owner himself.

“As they all say, ‘we’re going to welcome you with open arms when we get through this’ but right now it’s putting a lot of strain on their system up there.”

The other warning came in what sounded like an Amber Alert for a missing child.

Ontario sent out emergency messages on cellphones, television and radio Friday at 2 p.m. telling recent travellers they are at “high risk of spreading COVID-19.” The high-volume alerts will continue on mobile phones over the next two weeks as more Ontarians return from trips.

With the new coronavirus already responsible for 18 deaths in the province, the alert noted: “You are required by law to self-isolate for 14 days.

“Do not visit stores, family or friends,” Ford said at Queen’s Park minutes before the alerts went out with DO NOT in capital letters.

The alerts point readers to www.ontario.ca/page/2019-novel-coronavirus for more information.

While the “vast majority” of people are obeying the post-travel, stay-at-home orders issued by the federal government earlier this week, Ford said some may be unaware or tempted to sneak out.

“We thought it was a good reminder to get out and tell people this is still on…stay the course,” said Dr. David Williams, Ontario’s chief medical officer of health.

The new coronavirus virus has had a devastating impact in Italy, Iran, Spain and cases are on the rise in the United States. Travellers from the U.S. and Europe account for many of Ontario’s nearly 1,000 confirmed cases.

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A day after he accused an upscale grocer of price gouging for charging $30 for a package of sanitizing wipes that costs less than $5 in most stores, Ford said the few retailers who are “bad actors” can expect to see “very large fines” legalized within days under Ontario’s state of emergency order.

“I just won’t tolerate it. Anyone who wants to gouge the public in these times, we’re going to come down hard. We’re going to come down really hard on them,” he said.

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