The latest coronavirus news from Canada and around the world on Tuesday. This file will be updated throughout the day. Web links to longer stories if available.
05:30 am The federal tax update contains more than $ 1.5 billion to buy rapid tests right away, Star has learned.
The money will go to buy the tests directly and also help the provinces with the logistics of distributing them, a federal source said on condition of anonymity.
It’s one of the few new spending items to be included in Tuesday’s fiscal update, which will focus primarily on updating the books after last spring’s budget.
The goal is to respond to growing requests from provinces to make greater use of rapid tests to quickly detect the new variant of Omicron, which is highly contagious.
Read Heather Scoffield’s exclusive report from Star.
5:15 am Two out of three are not bad, unless your office has a mandatory COVID vaccine policy.
As the COVID vaccine booster rollout expands, labor law experts say workplace mandates will eventually include a third injection.
“Once the boosters are widely available, all companies that have a vaccine mandate will add the booster,” said Howard Levitt, a senior partner at Levitt Sheikh LLP, a law firm specializing in labor and employment law.
On Monday, Ontario began accepting reservations for COVID booster shots for anyone age 50 and older who received their second vaccine at least 168 days prior. In early January, the bookings will be expanded to include people 18 and over. The increasing availability of booster injections comes as Ontario faces a rapidly increasing number of COVID cases and a growing threat from the Omicron variant.
Read more from Josh Rubin from Star.
5:05 am Sara Fung was overwhelmed with excitement when the first COVID-19 vaccines began arriving in Canada last December, and again in March when she received her first dose.
When she felt the needle stick in her arm, the Hamilton area nurse thought of the grandmother who lost to COVID-19 almost a year earlier.
Pandemic restrictions prevented Fung from properly suffering the death of her grandmother when the “glue of the family” died in a long-term care home in Toronto in April 2020. Although the matriarch was 100 years old, Fung says she was healthy and animated, and would probably survive a couple more years.
“I remember feeling very lucky (to get the vaccine). It was really a tribute to my grandmother,” Fung said, pausing to hold back tears during a virtual interview. “I was thinking, ‘If this had been available to her, I have no doubt that she would still be alive today.’
Tuesday marks the first anniversary of the first COVID-19 vaccines administered in Canada, a milestone that offered hope for a new year after a dismal 2020.
Read more from The Canadian Press.
5 am As Ontario prepares for a surge in Omicron cases, the Kingston area is already struggling to contain the new variant of concern that has swept the city, forcing the region to enact new public health restrictions now in place. among the toughest in the province.
On Monday, Kingston, Frontenac and Lennox & Addington Public Health restricted meetings to just five people for the next week to slow the spread of COVID-19 as hospitals in the region, which now serve the largest number of coronavirus patients in Ontario, they warned of capacity constraints.
Cases of the Omicron variant in the region, which are among the lowest case counts in the first three waves of the pandemic and a high proportion of its vaccinated population, are skyrocketing in young adults, increasing rates. of infection already high of a Delta. it fueled the fourth wave that arrived last month.
Read more from Megan Ogilvie and May Warren from Star.
4:45 am Ontario will unveil new restrictions to protect nursing home residents from COVID-19 and is working to begin offering boosters for those 18 and older before January 4, as the Omicron variant spreads faster than usual. planned just a few days ago.
Measures to be taken Tuesday include requiring all nursing home visitors to be vaccinated and setting a limit of two visitors, government sources said.
“Visitors should get vaccinated at least twice because older people are more vulnerable,” said Lisa Levin of AdvantAge Ontario, representing nonprofit households.
“Things have changed.”
Homes have been testing visitors, but that’s not enough, Levin said, raising concerns about how many nursing home workers have backups and what could happen to the levels of care for frail and elderly residents if too many staff hire. the virus.
Read more from Rob Ferguson.
4:30 am A person who was on Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s flight.
back from the United Arab Emirates tested positive for COVID-19, the prime minister’s office said Tuesday.
Bennett returned to Israel on Monday from a historic two-day trip to the Arab Gulf state, the first by an Israeli leader to the country, which recently normalized ties with Israel.
He was quarantined for three days on Tuesday under Health Ministry regulations, which require all returning travelers, even those vaccinated, to self-isolate. He was expected to take a coronavirus test on Wednesday, also in accordance with health regulations, and then end his quarantine if he tests negative, the prime minister’s office said.
Reference-www.thestar.com