Canada Announces New Travel Restrictions As The World Prepares For Omicron

Politics Insider for December 1, 2021: Omicron Creates New Restrictions; new questions about vaccines; and a political challenge

Omicron measurements: Canada Announced Tuesday that air travelers from all countries except the United States will need to take COVID-19 tests upon arrival in Canada, CBC reports, while the world prepares for the Omicron variant.

the Evidence will be required of all travelers, regardless of your vaccination status, the Minister of Health Jean-Yves Duclos said today. The requirement will also apply to Canadian citizens and permanent residents. Incoming travelers You will have to self-isolate until they receive the test results. Duclos said the new testing requirement will take effect “as quickly and as much as possible over the next few days.”

The government too added Egypt, Malawi and Nigeria to your restricted list. Travelers from 10 countries will need to be quarantined at designated facilities.

The world is waiting for scientists to discover how effective vaccines against Omicron are. Dr. Isaac Bogoch, an expert at Toronto General Hospital, said we will have to wait to find out, but he believes that available vaccines will continue to be useful in the fight against COVID-19: “It would be extremely unusual for a variant to emerge that completely erases protective immunity. of vaccines. It could undermine some of the effectiveness, but It would be extremely unusual for our vaccinations, and or vaccine programs, to now become useless.. “

You can do more: Justin Trudeau told reporters the government may have to do more, Global reports.

Patience: On Maclean’s, Patricia treble It establishes what we know so far, not so much, about Omicron.

Omicron entered our lexicon at exactly 12 p.m. ET on November 26, according to Google Trends, which saw a massive spike in online searches. Since then, searches have only increased as people scour the web for news on the new variant of concern. However, the variant is so new that researchers struggle to unravel its secrets, probably for a few weeks, but possibly longer, and ask for patience.

Questioned prohibitions: Even as Canada tightened travel restrictions, news broke that the variant had already spread to Europe before South Africa raised the alarm, raising questions about the fairness and effectiveness of the restrictions in African nations. BalloonGeoffrey york reports from South Africa.

Over 60 stay at home: The World Health Organization has urged people over 60 not to travel due to the increased risk posed by the variant, the New York Post reports.

Vaccines for poor countries: Opposition Politicians and Medical Groups Urge Liberals to Support Global Initiative to Temporarily Remove Intellectual Property Restrictions on COVID-19 Vaccines, CTV reports. The government says it will discuss the issue with the World Trade Organization.

Same game: The situation recalls Isabelle hachey, writing on Press (translation), of the fight for AIDS drugs in Africa, and notes that Big Pharma can be expected to do everything possible to avoid losing revenue.

The 168 member states of the WTO should seize the opportunity to try to reach a consensus on the temporary lifting of patents that protect vaccines. So far, they have not been able to reach an agreement. One can imagine that Big Pharma is doing everything they can to discourage them. The sums at stake are pharaonic. If we go back to the past, it may be a long time before the Member States reach an agreement. Millions of Africans died of AIDS before the WTO adopted the Doha agreement in November 2001, after years of intense activism.

Challenging times: At Star, Susan delacourt writes that the variant presents a challenge to the political class, because polls show Canadians are anxious and depressed about the pandemic.

But all signs point to a great moral crisis looming, which politicians will have to fight to contain in the days and weeks to come. Just as Canadians were starting to plan Christmas gatherings and winter trips to sunnier climates, and a long-awaited return to normalcy. Threat resurfaces from more closures and renewed travel restrictions. So what does the political class have left in their arsenal, after nearly two years of this pandemic, to halt what could be the biggest wave of COVID-19 fatigue yet?

No jab? No trips: Unvaccinated travelers over the age of 12 can no longer board a passenger plane or train in Canada, CP reports. A grace period ended on Tuesday.

Fight over: On Maclean’s, your correspondent takes the temperature of the enemies of anti-carbon taxes, who once seemed to win, and concludes that the fight seems to have come out of the main protagonists, having lost on the field and in several elections.

Ontario Premier Doug ford, who won the support of grassroots Ontario Tories by opposing a carbon tax, was also happy to fight back. From Manitoba Brian Pallister, who had his own carbon tax plan, joined after Trudeau stood by his side and used him as an example of a cooperative prime minister. Behind the scenes, Stephen harper he was cheering on the prime ministers. “Let the others impose a carbon tax, because we can all win the next federal and provincial elections just on that issue”He said in speeches. It did not seem far-fetched: In 2008, the Liberals lost an election built around Stephane dion’s Green Shift (a combination of carbon taxes and tax cuts). Today, Pallister is gone, Kenney is setting new records for unpopularity, Ford no longer talks much about the carbon tax he once loved to attack, and Moe complains. “Are complaining but complying,” He says Tim gray, CEO of Environmental Defense, on the carbon tax.

Make it work: At Mail, Tasha Kheiriddin He reflects on the Pandemic Hybrid Parliament and concludes that it might be fine.

Virtual participation could even improve productivity in certain contexts, such as committees, which could continue to act even when Parliament is not. The ability to listen to witnesses remotely could broaden the connection between lawmakers who might not otherwise be able to appear in person. The reality is, with the work-from-home revolution, some form of hybrid Parliament is likely here to stay. We better make it work.

– Stephen Maher



Reference-www.macleans.ca

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