Ontario Premier Doug Ford made the dumbest move of his premiership Monday. His severe pandemic lockdown of the entire province will not only subject millions of Ontarians to unnecessary restrictions, it effectively undermines the idea that his government’s decision-making is driven by science, logic or even a minimum of rationality.

There is a significant COVID problem in Toronto, the GTA and Windsor-Essex. That’s not going to be helped one bit by shutting down everyday life in Ottawa, Northern Ontario and other areas where COVID numbers are light.

In his media conference, Ford tried to portray the lockdown as protecting the low-COVID areas from hordes of invading sick people. He specifically cited Ottawa, a city of one million people that has only 19 COVID cases in hospital, none in intensive care and just 378 active cases. Apparently, the city faces the hitherto unperceived threat of “droves” of Quebecers surging across the border to infect the populace.

Either those droves are facing a long drive, or they will come from Gatineau, the neighbouring Quebec municipality, which has 28 COVID cases in hospital, zero in intensive care and a total of 404 active cases.

Ford asserted that health officials are telling him that people from high-caseload areas are spreading the virus to other areas. Maybe so, but those health officials didn’t offer any proof of that in their own briefing and the numbers would suggest it’s not significant.

Even if Ford’s fears for Ottawa are correct, there is a far simpler solution: close the bridges to Quebec. Quebecers closed their side earlier this year, so they could hardly complain.

The Ottawa “reasoning” was just one example of a rich buffet of irrationality Ford had on offer. “Schools are not part of the problem,” the premier stated, but he’s closing them for weeks anyway. He repeatedly told Ontarians that they could be on the brink of a “catastrophic” situation. Why, just look at what’s happening to the William Osler Health System, which runs hospitals in Brampton and Etobicoke. Ford brought hospital CEO Dr. Naveed Mohammad to talk about how bad it was. So, get him some help; don’t shut down the entire province over it.