The latest coronavirus news from Canada and around the world on Monday. This file will be updated throughout the day. Web links to longer stories if available.
7 am: Researchers from McMaster University and the Offord Center for Child Studies are tracking the impact of the pandemic on the health and well-being of families. In some key areas, parents were worse off this year than last year.
“Overall symptoms of depression and anxiety were higher than our original findings during the first wave,” said the lead researcher. Andrea Gonzalez placeholder image, Associate Professor and Canada Tier II Research Chair in Family Health and Preventive Interventions.
During the first wave 7,434 parents surveyed and caregivers with children up to 17 years old. This year, between May 4 and July 3, during the third wave, they got comments from 10,778 respondents.
Last year, 57 percent of caregivers reported experiencing significant depressive symptoms in the past week, compared to 69 percent this year. Also last year, 30 percent reported moderate to high anxiety levels, compared to 38 percent this year.
Nearly half of the parents surveyed this year said they had sought help from a mental health professional and 40 percent reported needing help at least once during the pandemic but did not receive it.
Read the full story of Isabel Teotonio de Star.
6:47 am: Quebec is lifting capacity restrictions on bars and restaurants starting today, more than a year after imposing the limits to slow the spread of COVID-19.
Health Minister Christian Dubé announced last month that bars and restaurants in the province would be able to operate at full capacity and resume normal operating hours from November 1.
Bars and restaurants gradually reopened in Quebec over the summer after being closed for in-person dining, but some restrictions were maintained.
The establishments that serve alcohol will now be able to stay open until 3 in the morning and the distance between the tables will drop from two meters to one meter.
But there are still some rules: each table is limited to 10 people from no more than three different households.
The dancing and singing ban will remain in effect until further notice, and Quebecers still need to present their vaccination passport before entering and wear masks when moving inside.
6:45 am: On Monday, South Korea began allowing larger social gatherings and removed business hours restrictions at restaurants in what officials described as the first step in trying to restore some pre-pandemic normalcy.
The capital area has been under the strongest social distancing measures in the country, barring a lockdown since July. Citing fatigue from the pandemic and economic concerns, officials had relaxed measures in mid-October to allow gatherings of up to eight people if at least four were fully vaccinated.
Under the changes that began Monday, the limit for private social gatherings in the capital, Seoul and nearby metropolitan areas was raised to 10 people and 12 in other regions, regardless of whether participants are fully vaccinated or not.
Restaurants and coffee shops can now open for 24 hours, instead of having to close at 10 pm in the Seoul metropolitan area and at midnight in the rest of the country. However, high-risk entertainment venues, such as nightclubs, must close at midnight.
To use indoor sports facilities or visit patients in hospitals, individuals must show smartphone apps or documents issued by public health authorities that prove they are fully vaccinated or tested negative for the virus within a time frame. 48 hours.
The meeting limits at political rallies or social events such as exhibitions or weddings were raised to a maximum of 499 people if all participants are fully vaccinated. Larger crowds will also be allowed in professional sports.
6:45 am: Fireworks erupted as visitors to Shanghai Disneyland awaited COVID-19 test results, surrounded by healthcare workers dressed from head to toe in white protective suits.
Shanghai Disneyland suddenly announced Sunday night that it was no longer accepting new visitors and was cooperating with an epidemiological investigation from another province. They then closed the park as Shanghai city health workers and police rushed to conduct a mass screening of visitors already inside.
After testing everyone, the park will remain closed on Monday and Tuesday as it continues to cooperate with pandemic prevention efforts, Shanghai Disneyland said in a statement Monday.
The sudden lockdown and temporary closure of the park underscored how serious China is in enforcing its zero-tolerance pandemic prevention strategy.
Globally, many countries have chosen to live with the virus, either by choice or necessity, although as waves of viruses come and go, many face overburdened health care systems and additional deaths.
In China, which has kept its borders sealed since March 2020, the response has been to cut the chain of virus transmission as quickly as possible. With a strict quarantine-on-arrival policy, authorities have aimed to bring every local outbreak to zero, helping China maintain its reported totals at 4,636 deaths and 97,243 cases since the pandemic began.
The case that may have sparked Disneyland’s actions involved a person whose illness was discovered in the nearby city of Hangzhou and had visited the theme park on Saturday, local media reported.
6:45 am: Sydney International Airport came to life with tears, hugs and laughter on Monday as Australia opened its border for the first time in 20 months, and some arriving travelers removed their mandatory masks to see the faces of their loved ones from those who have been. separated for so long.
Australia and other Asia-Pacific countries have had some of the world’s most stringent COVID-19 pandemic lockdown measures and travel restrictions, but with rising vaccination rates and falling cases, many are beginning to reopen cautiously.
Some, like China and Japan, remain essentially closed to foreign visitors, but Thailand also began to reopen substantially on Monday and many others have already started, or plan to follow suit.
6:45 am: The global death toll from COVID-19 surpassed 5 million on Monday, less than two years after a crisis that has not only devastated poor countries, but also humiliated the rich with world-class healthcare systems. .
Together, the United States, the European Union, Britain and Brazil, all high- or upper-middle-income countries, account for an eighth of the world’s population, but almost half of all reported deaths. The United States alone has recorded more than 740,000 lives lost, more than any other nation.
“This is a watershed moment in our life,” said Dr. Albert Ko, an infectious disease specialist at the Yale School of Public Health. “What do we have to do to protect ourselves and not reach another 5 million?”
The death toll, counted by Johns Hopkins University, is roughly equal to the populations of Los Angeles and San Francisco combined. It competes with the number of people killed in battles between nations since 1950, according to estimates by the Oslo Peace Research Institute. Globally, COVID-19 is now the third leading cause of death, after heart disease and stroke.
The staggering figure is almost certainly an undercount due to limited testing and people dying at home without medical care, especially in poor parts of the world like India.
The hot spots have changed over the 22 months since the outbreak began, turning different places on the world map red. Now the virus is hitting Russia, Ukraine and other parts of Eastern Europe, especially where rumors, misinformation and mistrust in the government have hampered vaccination efforts. In Ukraine, only 17% of the adult population is fully vaccinated; in Armenia, only 7%.
“What’s uniquely different about this pandemic is that it hit high-resource countries the hardest,” said Dr. Wafaa El-Sadr, director of ICAP, a global health center at Columbia University. “That is the irony of COVID-19.”
Richer nations with longer life expectancies have a higher proportion of older people, cancer survivors and residents of nursing homes, all of whom are especially vulnerable to COVID-19, El-Sadr noted. The poorest countries tend to have a higher proportion of children, adolescents and young adults, who are less likely to become seriously ill from the coronavirus.
India, despite its terrifying delta rise that peaked in early May, now has a much lower daily death rate than Russia, the United States or Britain, although there is uncertainty surrounding its numbers.
The apparent disconnect between wealth and health is a paradox disease experts will be pondering for years. But the pattern seen on a large scale, when nations are compared, is different when examined more closely. Within each rich country, when deaths and infections are mapped, the poorest neighborhoods are hit the hardest.
Reference-www.thestar.com