Despite the initial shock of businesses being closed and employment for many halted, Hammington said that she doesn’t think the strong public health measures initially instituted to prevent the spread of Covid increased the level of poverty, or the difficulties, but rather “quite the opposite.” She said, “What it did do was expose serious, serious inequities. All of a sudden people who were trying to scrape by with part-time jobs in addition to their full-time work were able to pay their rent [because of the monthly CERB payments of $2,000].