ADM Mat Protective Measures

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Protective Measures

Background

It is important to note that Public Health Measures (PHM) and advice are continuously evolving, thus the approach will be revisited on an ongoing basis to ensure proper compliance. Should individual requirements/responsibilities change, staff will be informed in a timely manner by their Chain of Command. In order to ensure everyone in the Defence Team are aware of the personal measures expected of them as it relates to the current COVID-19 pandemic, here is what you should know: As part of Canada’s effort to combat novel coronavirus (COVID-19), the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces have put in place numerous precautions and implemented various measures to protect our personnel, while maintaining our readiness to assist the Government of Canada when and where requested to do so.

It is crucial to inform and train our Defence Team to ensure the safety of each other, ourselves our families, and our communities. It’s important to have a clear understanding of the two types of protective measures, and how they will be employed in the workplace.

1. Personal Protective Equipment is medical- and industrial-grade equipment primarily designed to protect you from infection by pathogens like COVID-19 when performing tasks/duties that may bring you into close contact with carriers or suspected carriers of the disease and/or their belongings. It includes specially designed masks, gloves, and eye protection. Medical-grade Personal Protective Equipment also protects others who are in close proximity to the wearer from possible COVID-19 infection. When wearing Personal Protective Equipment, it’s important to still maintain Public Health Measures like physical distancing and proper hand washing.
   • Examples when Personal Protective Equipment is needed would be situations where first responders and frontline medical personnel are in close contact with infected individuals and/or their belongings, or when working in a suspected contamination zone.
2. Public Health Measures are behaviours, actions, such as the wearing of non-medical masks which reduce the risk of transmission and infection of viruses. These measures protect others from you in the course of your normal activities in the DND/CAF workplace and in the community.
   • Examples of Public Health Measures that are expected of you include, as a minimum, maintaining physical distancing and frequent and thorough hand washing with soapy water. The wearing of a non-medical (or homemade) mask which covers both your nose and mouth, is required when proper physical distancing cannot be maintained, in order to ensure your safety and the safety of those around you.
   • It is expected that anyone exhibiting any kind of cold or flu-like symptoms remain at home.

The best Public Health Measures, emphasized by both the Surgeon General and Public Health Agency of Canada, are physical distancing and frequent/thorough hand washing.

The following Public Health Measures must be applied by the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces personnel to the greatest extent possible in all risk environments:

• If you leave home, maintain a minimum two metre distance from others as much as possible, and if not possible, wear a non-medical mask; and
• Wash your hands often with soap and water for at least 20 seconds, especially after using the bathroom and when preparing food (> 60% alcohol-based hand sanitizer is an alternative).
• Stay and work at home unless it is operationally essential that you go into work or until you are directed to return under formal business resumption protocols;
• Avoid non-essential trips within your community;
• Avoid gathering in groups;
• Avoid touching your eyes, nose, or mouth with unwashed hands;
• Limit contact with people at a higher risk of having a severe disease (e.g., older adults, those in poor health);
• Cough/sneeze into a tissue or the bend in your arm and not your hands, and stay home if you have flu-like symptoms

As this crisis evolves, the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces will continue to provide updated direction and guidance to our personnel with respect to Public Health Measures and on the usage of Personal Protective Equipment.

For specific training information on the proper use of Public Health Measures and Personal Protective Equipment, please visit the Canadian Forces Health Services Training Centre

Posters

Download: https://collaboration-materiel.forces.mil.ca/sites/DCOS/COVID19/admmatcovid19/PublishingImages/SitePages/Protective%20Measures/personal-protective-equipment-public-health-measures.pdf

Use Open Standards and Solutions by Default

The Directive on Management of Information Technology and Digital Standards states that where possible, open source software be used first, The primary driving factors for this are:

1. Aligning with Open Government
2. Supporting the Local Economy and Communities
3. Lowering initial and long term Cost of Solutions
4. Increasing Security
5. Increasing Quality of Solutions
6. Increasing Productivity across Government of Canada by enabling reuse
7. Improving Job Satisfaction
8. Reducing Vendor Lock

• Where possible, use open source standards, and open source software first
  • While OSS is not a silver bullet several common misconceptions are used as arguments against Open Source software:
    • A misconception with security is that with the code out of the eyes of the public that it prevents successful attacks and lowers liability, however in reality Security Best practices state that 'System security should not depend on the secrecy of the implementation or its components', and as Open Source development relies n hardening (or improving the security) of code it is often equal or more secure then proprietary solutions.
    • A misconception with support is that a support contract or license some how ensures that the proprietary system will receive improvements and patches, but in reality there is no obligation for a vendor to do so, while Open Source software survives by having a vibrant and helpful support community. Average resolution of issues are solved faster then in proprietary software by the very nature of crowd sourcing reducing the barrier of communication with a single entity or individual.

• If an open source option is not available or does not meet user needs, favour platform-agnostic COTS over proprietary COTS, avoiding technology dependency, allowing for substitutability and interoperability
  • Vendor lock is a real concern in the Development of Applications, and when propietary COTS applications are selected it increases the difficulty of ever moving to a new system, and any integration or interoperability functions.
• If a custom-built application is the appropriate option, by default any source code written by the government must be released in an open format via Government of Canada website and services designated by the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat
  • It is important to reduce the duplication of effort that has occurred due to segmented mandates, and increase collaboration and sharing across Departments and Agencies. Crown Corporations, Provincial and Municipal Governments as well as the Public at large who can benefit from new and innovative products and services based off of creations from the Government.
  • Major benefits can occur not just from publishing the Software, but in developing Guidance the quality of software increases, while publishing Lessons Learned, White Papers and any other technical documentation can assist others in the future by providing templates and baselines.
  • For assistance in how to do this, you can view theTBS Guidance on Open Source Publishing
  • Setting up shared teams for common problems where Developers from multiple departments can produce better solutions. Virtual Teams using open tools can enable rapid development in absence of collocation.
• All open source code must be released under an appropriate open source software license
  • It is important to ensure that the License chosen for OSS protects the rights of Government of Canada and Public Servants while enabling the use and re-use of software. Guidance can be found here.
• Expose public data to implement Open Data and Open Information initiatives
  • Scientific Innovation can occur from exposing Data to interested members of the activists, researchers, students and the public at large.
  • Define Metadata for your application early in both English and French to support your release to https://open.canada.ca/en/open-data
  • Development following the Government of Canada Standards on APIs can allow rapid uptake into Open Data feeds.

Enable Interoperability

• Expose all functionality as services
  • Do not hide services under assumptions that someone would not find value in a service - often innovation can be bred from exposed services beyond it's original plan.
  • Follow the 'eat your own dogfood' mantra - in that all functionality should be a service that you consume.
• Use microservices built around business capabilities. Scope each service to a single purpose
  • Focus on smallest unit of purpose, and developing a single function.
• Run each IT service in its own process and have it communicate with other services through a well-defined interface, such as a HTTPS-based application programming interface (API)à
  • Ensure that services are accessible via common methodologies, and follow the Government of Canada Standards on APIs
• Run applications in containers
  • Ensure containers contain a single application, and build the smallest image possible.
  • Ensure containers are properly versioned and tagged.
• Leverage the GC Digital Exchange Platform for components such as the API Store, Messaging, and the GC Service Bus
  • Ensure APIs are discoverable on the API Store.