Ministers give an update on the government's measures to help Canadians with the effects of COVID-19 pandemic in Ottawa on Mar. 18, 2020. Andrew Meade/iPolitics

A clear majority of respondents in a new Mainstreet Research poll said they approve of the federal Liberal government’s handling of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.

READ MORE: Ottawa unveils $82B aid package to support workers and businesses hurt by outbreak

In the automated telephone poll of 1,665 Canadian adults, completed between March 16 and 17, 31 per cent said they viewed the government’s response to the fast-spreading virus “somewhat positively,” while 25.1 per cent ranked it as very positively. Comparatively, 16.1 per cent said they viewed the response “somewhat negatively,” 20 per cent selected “very negatively,” while 7.7 said they were “not sure.”

Respondents were asked “based on what you have seen and heard, how do you rate the federal government’s handling of COVID-19, otherwise known as the coronavirus?”

The margin of error for the poll is reported as plus or minus 2.4 percentage points at the 95 per cent confidence level. Margins of error are higher for the subsamples.

The poll was conducted before the Trudeau government announced it was closing Canada’s border with the U.S. to all non-essential travel and unveiled a sweeping $82-billion aid package on Wednesday that will provide direct support to Canadians forced from work and for businesses facing hardship due to the shutdown of public life caused by the growing coronavirus outbreak.

However, it was conducted after the federal government pledged $1 billion last week to address the health and economic impacts of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Half of that funding went to the provinces and territories — which are managing the frontline public health response to the outbreak — to support their critical healthcare needs and mitigation efforts. As part of the announcement, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the federal government will waive the mandatory one week waiting period to access employment insurance benefits for those in self-isolation.

Mainstreet also polled Canadians on how concerned they were about the virus: 45.5 per cent said they were “very concerned,” 33 per cent selected “somewhat concerned,” 11.8 per cent claimed they were “not very concerned,” while only 5.8 per cent said they were “not at all concerned” Finally, 4.1 per cent said they were “not sure.”

Specifically, Mainstreet asked respondents “how concerned are you about the coronavirus pandemic?”

In another question, the poll asked respondents for their thoughts on the federal government’s handling of the economy since last fall’s election. For that question, 20.4 per cent said they “strongly approve,” 25.2 per cent selected “somewhat approve,” 19.1 per cent responded “somewhat disapprove,” 24.8 per cent opted for “strongly disapprove” and 10.5 per cent said they were not sure.

The exact question put to respondents “based on what you have seen and heard, do you approve or disapprove of the federal government’s handling of the economy since last fall’s election?”

iPolitics subscribers can access the regional and demographic breakdown of the polling numbers here.

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