WINNIPEG -- Deaths in long-term care homes account for around half of all COVID-19 fatalities in Manitoba. It’s a stark reminder of the devastating toll the coronavirus pandemic has taken on vulnerable and elderly people. Looking back over the past year, advocates, experts and families point to a system they feel was unprepared for a threat hidden in plain sight—one that some relatives say wasn’t taken seriously until it was too late. “We’re all going to end up in places like this at one point or another,” said Alvin Cadonic, who has an aunt and an uncle living at Maples Personal Care Home. “Really, we’re just fighting for own futures as well as the futures of our relatives that can’t advocate on their own.”