TORONTO —
News that Canada is behind other countries in their COVID-19 vaccination rollout schemes – while in a critical point in the pandemic – has experts worried the country won’t meet the September 2021vaccination goal set by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
The vast geography of the country, including remote communities where the logistics of flying in healthcare is complicated –as well as tricky storage requirements of the Pfizer vaccine, were initially pointed out as roadblocks to the rollout.
But with the arrival of Moderna’s easier-to-store vaccine, and Health Canada reviewing more vaccine products on the horizon, experts say governments need to shift focus.
“I think there was a lot of attention given to getting vaccines into the freezers, but not enough attention from freezer to arm,” biostatician Ryan Imgrund, who works with Ottawa Public Health, said in an email to CTV News.ca Wednesday.
“They were so worried about the cold storage requirement that they seemingly forgot that the vaccine needs to come out and actually get in to people,” he said.
It was a sentiment echoed by the Dean of health sciences at Queens University and former federal minister of health Dr. Jane Philpott.
“We need to empty those freezers… there’s no point in pacing ourselves on this,” Philpott said on CTV’s News Channel Wednesday. “That’s what really is going to turn this pandemic around, is getting people the vaccine protection they need.”
The federal government released 500,000 doses of both the Pfizer and Modern vaccines back in December, but the actual distribution and rollout of the inoculations is at the discretion of provinces and territories.
Ontario’s stunted rollout
Ontario has been criticised repeatedly for its vaccination initiatives having trouble getting off the ground, as the province surpassed 200,000 total COVID-19 cases Wednesday.
The Ontario Liberal party called for the military to be used to step up Ontario’s vaccination phases Wednesday, after Premier Doug Ford’s government took some significant heat for shuttering vaccination stations during the Christmas holidays.
“I am urging the premier to request immediate assistance from the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) who are well-positioned to provide important logistical leadership and support,” Ontario Liberal Leader Steven Del Duca said in a statement.
Ret. Gen. Rick Hillier, who was tapped by Ford to lead Ontario’s vaccination rollout, admitted that halting vaccinations over the holidays was a mistake, and that the taskforce’s initial scheme of holding back the 35,000 second doses of the Pfizer vaccine also slowed them down.
Hillier rebutted claims that vaccines were languishing in freezers on CTV News Ottawa’s Morning Live show Wednesday – instead claiming that the issue was one of supply chains.
“Yesterday, we vaccinated more than 10,000 people in the province of Ontario, we will do the same and more again today. We are at the point now where we will start running out of vaccines as the people who need the second shot [of the Pfizer vaccine] start coming back,” he said.
Hillier said the vaccine taskforce plans to administer 55,000 doses of 161 long-term care homes in the regions of Toronto, Peel, York and Windsor-Essex by Jan. 21.
There has been no deadline set for the rest of the province.
Ottawa’s Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Vera Etches announced on Twitter Tuesday that they would begin vaccinating people outside of the Ottawa Hospital – which had been the central distribution hub – and directly into long-term care homes.
Ontario’s Minister of Health Christine Elliot said Wednesday that 60,000 vaccines have been administered in Ontario so far.
In a statement emailed to CTV News.ca Wednesday, the Ontario Ministry of Health said that the province’s vaccine rollout is “well underway” and that it remains committed to administering them “as safely and efficiently as possible.”
“We have received 95,000 doses of the Pfizer vaccine so far, that are currently being administered at 19 hospitals – soon to be expanded to 28 – continuing until the end of March 2021,” the statement reads.
The Ministry of Health also noted in its statement that Ontario recently received 53,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine which will “be used for vaccinations at long-term care homes and retirement homes.”
“We continue to ask all Ontarians to remain vigilant and continue following public health measures.”
The sense of urgency is a good sign, Philpott says.
“I’m pleased to see that over the last 24-48 hours the pace is definitely picking up across the country,” she said. “Ontario is seeing almost a doubling of the rate of vaccines getting out of freezers and into arms, and we need to continue doing that.”
Philpott says she is hopeful that a “significant number” of vaccines will be arriving this week and next week to pick up the pace.
So far approximate 4,100 first-dose appointments have been made for Jan. 4 to 10, with 2,000 more available.
The province is hoping to vaccinate around 40,000 people by the end of January.
Quebec, which had its long-term care homes decimated by COVID-19, took the extra step of putting vaccine distribution centres inside of the homes in an effort to vaccinate residents.
British Columbia also put vaccination distribution directly into long-term care homes, with 24,139 people vaccinated as of Sunday.
B.C expects approximately 792,000 doses of the Pfizer and Modern vaccines to be distributed through the end of March.
The province released their updated vaccination plan Monday – which targets populations like seniors living in the community who are at least 80 years old and Indigenous seniors who are at least 65.
The province received approximately 46,000 doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, and said their continued rollout will depend on the available supply.
Nova Scotia is opening COVID-19 immunization clinics to help achieve its goal of vaccinating at least 75 per cent of the population by the end of September.
The province received a combined 9,550 doses of Pfizer and Moderns vaccines and has been targeting healthcare workers in their Phase 1 rollout which runs from January to April 2021.
How can we fix it?
“A key to maximizing efficiency in these complex logistical operations is minimizing downtime or non-productive time,” said Director of the Centre for Healthcare Engineering at the University of Toronto Professor Timothy Chan, in an email to CTV News.ca Wednesday.
“Retail figured out long ago that inventory sitting on shelves costs them money. The same concept applies here, except now we’re talking lives.”
Chan also criticized the petering out of vaccinations around the holidays.
“COVID doesn’t take a holiday so neither should we,” he said.
Imgrund says Ontario’s initial vaccines should have gone to long-term care facilities immediately, and noted the government’s apparent lack of preparation.
“Vaccination schedules should be made weeks before the vaccine touches ground. You can always cancel appointments. But scheduling in new ones is always difficult,” he said.
Philpott also touched on the logistics.
“Everybody has a responsibility here,” she said. “We need to ramp up the mechanisms to make sure they are delivered as quickly as possible to the people who need them.”
Chan says that fixing the problem relies on accurately identifying the “key limiting factors” or “bottlenecks.”
“Is it a lack of healthcare workers to deliver the vaccines? Is it a lack of space at the vaccination sites? Is it a lack of coordination and leadership? Right now, the only limiting factor should be our vaccine supply,” he said.
“Start a massive scheduling operation to just get people to these sites (or doses delivered to LTC homes) and start administering the vaccine around the clock if we need to,” he said.
For Ontario’s situation, Imgrund said that the province “eventually needs to get to 40,000 vaccinations per day” in order to vaccinate the entire population.
“Phase 1 is the most important phase when it comes to saving lies and reducing hospitalization…It is easier to ramp down in the future than ramp up,” he said.
TORONTO – Roots Corp. may have built its brand on all things comfy and cosy, but its CEO says activewear is now “really becoming a core part” of the brand.
The category, which at Roots spans leggings, tracksuits, sports bras and bike shorts, has seen such sustained double-digit growth that Meghan Roach plans to make it a key part of the business’ future.
“It’s an area … you will see us continue to expand upon,” she told analysts on a Friday call.
The Toronto-based retailer’s push into activewear has taken shape over many years and included several turns as the official designer and supplier of Team Canada’s Olympic uniform.
But consumers have had plenty of choice when it comes to workout gear and other apparel suited to their sporting needs. On top of the slew of athletic brands like Nike and Adidas, shoppers have also gravitated toward Lululemon Athletica Inc., Alo and Vuori, ramping up competition in the activewear category.
Roach feels Roots’ toehold in the category stems from the fit, feel and following its merchandise has cultivated.
“Our product really resonates with (shoppers) because you can wear it through multiple different use cases and occasions,” she said.
“We’ve been seeing customers come back again and again for some of these core products in our activewear collection.”
Her remarks came the same day as Roots revealed it lost $5.2 million in its latest quarter compared with a loss of $5.3 million in the same quarter last year.
The company said the second-quarter loss amounted to 13 cents per diluted share for the quarter ended Aug. 3, the same as a year earlier.
In presenting the results, Roach reminded analysts that the first half of the year is usually “seasonally small,” representing just 30 per cent of the company’s annual sales.
Sales for the second quarter totalled $47.7 million, down from $49.4 million in the same quarter last year.
The move lower came as direct-to-consumer sales amounted to $36.4 million, down from $37.1 million a year earlier, as comparable sales edged down 0.2 per cent.
The numbers reflect the fact that Roots continued to grapple with inventory challenges in the company’s Cooper fleece line that first cropped up in its previous quarter.
Roots recently began to use artificial intelligence to assist with daily inventory replenishments and said more tools helping with allocation will go live in the next quarter.
Beyond that time period, the company intends to keep exploring AI and renovate more of its stores.
It will also re-evaluate its design ranks.
Roots announced Friday that chief product officer Karuna Scheinfeld has stepped down.
Rather than fill the role, the company plans to hire senior level design talent with international experience in the outdoor and activewear sectors who will take on tasks previously done by the chief product officer.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
VANCOUVER – Mediated talks between the union representing HandyDART workers in Metro Vancouver and its employer, Transdev, are set to resume today as a strike that has stopped most services drags into a second week.
No timeline has been set for the length of the negotiations, but Joe McCann, president of the Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1724, says they are willing to stay there as long as it takes, even if talks drag on all night.
About 600 employees of the door-to-door transit service for people unable to navigate the conventional transit system have been on strike since last Tuesday, pausing service for all but essential medical trips.
Hundreds of drivers rallied outside TransLink’s head office earlier this week, calling for the transportation provider to intervene in the dispute with Transdev, which was contracted to oversee HandyDART service.
Transdev said earlier this week that it will provide a reply to the union’s latest proposal on Thursday.
A statement from the company said it “strongly believes” that their employees deserve fair wages, and that a fair contract “must balance the needs of their employees, clients and taxpayers.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
MONTREAL – Travel company Transat AT Inc. reported a loss in its latest quarter compared with a profit a year earlier as its revenue edged lower.
The parent company of Air Transat says it lost $39.9 million or $1.03 per diluted share in its quarter ended July 31.
The result compared with a profit of $57.3 million or $1.49 per diluted share a year earlier.
Revenue in what was the company’s third quarter totalled $736.2 million, down from $746.3 million in the same quarter last year.
On an adjusted basis, Transat says it lost $1.10 per share in its latest quarter compared with an adjusted profit of $1.10 per share a year earlier.
Transat chief executive Annick Guérard says demand for leisure travel remains healthy, as evidenced by higher traffic, but consumers are increasingly price conscious given the current economic uncertainty.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
