Despite the global COVID-19 pandemic, babies are still being born and Toronto labour room nurse Marianne Ryan, 38, is needed at work.

But her daycare is closed and she is scrambling to find appropriate care for her sons, aged eight and 10.

“My kids are being watched by my parents who are over age 65 and at risk of the virus,” Ryan said Monday. “And they have to come on the TTC to watch my kids which is also a risk.”

To make matters worse, Ryan’s stepmother also cares for her own ailing parents who are in their 90s, and that’s a concern too, she added.

Ontario’s chief medical officer of health Monday recommended all child-care programs in the province suspend operations as a precaution, a move many parents, early childhood educators and daycare operators welcomed to help slow the spread of the virus.

The decision follows all provinces except British Columbia and Manitoba, which have closed or are planning to close child-care programs along with public schools.

But Ontario still falls short of Quebec, where as of Monday the province is providing free emergency daycare for kids up to age 13 whose parents are employed in health or social services, emergency services, correctional facilities and child-care centres offering support.

Ontario has also yet to match Nova Scotia which is compensating operators, paying child-care staff, and ensuring parents don’t have to pay fees while daycares are closed in that province.

“Now that child care is closed in Ontario, we need to be organizing emergency child care for essential workers and figuring out how to pay staff,” said Carolyn Ferns of the Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care.

The coalition, along with the Association of Early Childhood Educators of Ontario, launched an online petition Friday urging the Ford government to close all child-care programs in the wake of a decision by school boards to shutter centres in schools.

More than 7,000 parents, early childhood educators and daycare operators signed the petition before Ontario’s chief medical officer of health Dr. David Williams recommended all child care provinces to close.

At Queen’s Park, Williams said he is “assessing and reviewing” how essential workers such as nurses and doctors will be able to cope on the home front without child care.

“If it becomes an issue and we become aware of it, we would look at ideas and alternatives that would assist, especially to ensure that our essential staff can report to work and continue to serve our health system,” he told reporters.

Williams said he could recommend measures to the government or rely on the provincial government to step forward with a “policy direction.” He did not recommend that all daycares close last week, knowing that essential workers would need them.

“That’s why we initially kept them open,” Williams said.

Martha Friendly of the Toronto-based Childcare Resource and Research Unit said child care has been a challenge across the country.

“Different provinces have picked up different pieces,” she said. “But my impression is that they are all really scrambling.

“It’s not easy to provide emergency child care for essential workers,” she added. “For example, the list of essential workers I saw from Quebec doesn’t seem extensive enough to me.”

Friendly said she was pleased Williams ended the uncertainty in Ontario where child-care centres in schools were closed and many in the community were still operating.

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But now that all child-care programs are shuttered, Ontario has to ensure programs survive the COVID-19 crisis.

“Child-care centres will not be viable if parents don’t pay fees,” she said, adding that “if centres aren’t there that’s going to be a huge problem in an economic recovery situation.”

NDP child-care critic Doly Begum spoke with Education Minister Stephen Lecce and Health Minister Christine Elliott Monday to express similar concerns.

“It was a very constructive call and (Lecce) did say he would get back to me with answers,” she said. “So I’m really hopeful that they do.”