Premier Doug Ford is feeling for all of us who are weary of the seemingly neverending pandemic lockdown measures.

He expressed his grave concern about the mental health of his constituents during his press conference on Thursday, a once daily event that will, as of last week, only happen when he has an important update for residents about the state of the health crisis in the province.

Today's briefing was about some much-needed changes coming to Ontario's long-term care system, but the topic of the psychological impacts of the current grey-level lockdown in Toronto, Peel, York and Windsor-Essex also arose.

"I mention it all the time to our health experts... I say 'how do you measure [the health effects] when a person has a small business, they've put everything they have into it, and now they have to declare bankruptcy and they're struggling to put food on the table and pay their rent or mortgage," Ford said.

"We're seeing addictions rise right now, we're seeing suicides rise, domestic disputes... so we have to measure everything."

Doug Ford has been disastrous for my mental health.

— James 🥚🥚🥚 (@jpops83) December 17, 2020

As one reporter pointed out during today's quesiton period, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business has actually started training additional staff to help counsel small business owners who have suffered the loss of potentially their entire livelihoods this year.

Ford's reply was that, in his opinion, we all need a bit of counselling right now.

"We do need a lot of counselling, everyone," Ford said. "People have COVID fatigue, I call it. They're down."

But, he took a moment to remind the population that though things have been really tough for months now — particularly in these most recent weeks of stringent grey- and red-level lockdown in parts of the province — the forthcoming arrival of the COVID-19 vaccine means that better days and that well-mourned normalcy are indeed ahead.

"Folks, I've gotta stand and I'm gonna give you hope, there is hope. We are going to get through this, we will get people vaccinated and we will turn on the economy," he reassured viewers.

Unfortunately for those who are deep in the depths of lockdown despair, he also said that moves such as extending restrictions or even making them more severe in hotspot regions like Toronto are definitely still on the table at this point.