It is really important right now to pay attention to this kind of quarantine issue if you're going to be traveling,

if you're going to be in a situation where you might be exposed to others or

where you can protect others by quarantining yourself, now is the time to do it

and to do it carefully because this is when it can be especially effective. Hi, you're listening to Epidemic, the podcast about the science, public health and

social impacts of the coronavirus pandemic.

I'm your host, Dr. Saline Gounder. Roxanne Kamsi is a science reporter based in Montreal.

Like all of us, Roxanne missed out on a lot of big life events this year because of the pandemic.

The demands of quarantine have become a major issue for her.

Here in Canada, I can't go visit my sister in Colorado and come back without sitting at home

for 14 days and I'm not allowed to go to the grocery store and I'm not allowed to walk a dog if I had a dog. I really can't leave the house.

The word quarantine goes all the way back to the Middle Ages.

Back then, the disease people were worried about was the plague.

So the city of Venice started requiring ships to anchor in the harbour for 40 days before they could

come ashore to prove they didn't have the plague.

The word quarantine comes from the Italian words for 40 days.

Makes a 14 day quarantine sound easy, right? But quarantine rules in Canada are serious.

People are ordered to quarantine in their homes for 14 days after they return from abroad.

There are big fines if someone doesn't comply.

Fines as big as a million dollars.

It's a million dollars. It's a million dollars Canadian.

So it's a little less.

All the same, that's still a lot of money.

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