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At some point, the COVID-19 crisis will abate. The curve will flatten, authorities will get a better grasp on the response and Canadians will see some of the draconian restrictions placed on their lives gradually eased.

It’s tempting to suggest things will return to normal, but that’s unlikely. The changes wrought by the pandemic will be broad and deep. Its impact ranges across the most critical areas of Canadian life, from health care to the economy to personal security and the extent of government involvement in each of those spheres.

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Our health-care system has been shown to have been badly ill-prepared for an emergency of this magnitude. We can’t even get critically needed supplies to the people facing the greatest danger — health workers on the front line of the crisis — much less Canadians struggling to make sense of the flood of advice and regulations pouring forth each day. The horrors emerging at a number of care homes for the elderly can’t help but affect people’s thinking about dealing with aging loved ones. The gulf between the availability of medical facilities in small towns and rural areas, and those in major cities, has been laid bare as never before.