Hamilton's associate medical officer of health apologizes to Premier Doug Ford

Hamilton's associate medical officer of health, Dr. Bart Harvey,issued an apology letter to Premier Doug Ford after "inappropriate comments" he made.

Ford said on Wednesday that public health officials plan to test all 78,000 residents and 56,000 health-care workers in long-term care homes.

Harvey called Ford unqualified and said the testing was unnecessary.

"(You) don't do testing for the sake of doing testing, even though (that's) what our premier says," he told the Hamilton Spectator.

"And quite frankly, he's not a medical scientist. He's not a health scientist. He's a premier ... I didn't go to medical school with Premier Ford."

The city released an email, Thursday evening, containing Harvey's apology.

"I have tremendous respect for the Premier's role in this emergency and the difficult decisions you need to make every day. I am very passionate about my work but that is no excuse for my inappropriate comments," Harvey wrote to the Premier.

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On Thursday, Ford revealedhis 95-year-old mother-in-law has COVID-19.

There are 364 people infected with the virus in Hamilton as of Thursday and 17 have died.