After a few initial hiccups, COVID-19 vaccine rollout has finally picked up pace in Canada.
As of Wednesday, more than 3.8 million doses had been distributed to provinces and territories across the country. Out of these, 2.5 million doses have been administered, with more than 2 million Canadians having received at least one dose of an approved coronavirus vaccine.
“Canada is getting ready to go into the ramp-up phase after a steep increase in vaccine availability,” said Maj.-Gen. Dany Fortin, the military officer overseeing the country’s vaccine distribution effort, during a news conference Wednesday.
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Between April and June, 25 million doses of Pfizer and Moderna’s vaccine are expected, followed by another 1.5 million from AstraZeneca by mid-May, Fortin added.
Janet Cordahi/Global News Graphics
The influx of vaccines comes after a month-long lull from Pfizer as it went through factory upgrades and a slash in deliveries promised by Moderna.
Some experts warn Canada could see more speed bumps in the weeks and months ahead because it is heavily reliant on the foreign drugmakers and the goodwill of other countries – where the vaccine supplies are coming from.
“We can expect the unexpected,” said Jillian Kohler, a professor at the University of Toronto’s Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy.
“We are at the mercy of companies that are outside of our borders and as a result of that, other nations’ interests,” she told Global News.
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0:32 Coronavirus: Canada preparing to ‘ramp up’ vaccine distribution
Coronavirus: Canada preparing to ‘ramp up’ vaccine distribution
Where are Canada’s vaccines coming from?
Canada has ordered the world’s highest number of COVID-19 vaccine doses per capita, but none of the shots are being manufactured in the country.
Moderna’s supplies to Canada come from Switzerland, where the company has set up a secondary production plant, in addition to its U.S. headquarters.
Currently, Canada is receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine from the Serum Institute of India. Supplies slated for later in the year will come from the U.S. and South Korea as part of the WHO-led COVAX program.
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Meanwhile, there is no timeline set for when the Johnson & Johnson deliveries will arrive, nor is there confirmation on which of its two sites — in Europe and the U.S. — the doses will come from.
The company has already told Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “there are challenges around production.”
With many variables at play, Kohler says expected vaccine supplies are not a given and Canada is in a “very precarious and unsafe situation right now.”
“It’s absolutely frightening to think that we don’t have vaccine sovereignty.”
The federal government has faced criticism from opposition parties over its response to the delays in deliveries of vaccines by Pfizer and Moderna in recent weeks, as well as the country’s inability to produce much-needed COVID-19 vaccines at home.
5:01 How would 24-hour vaccination clinics work? Doctor answers your COVID-19 questions
How would 24-hour vaccination clinics work? Doctor answers your COVID-19 questions
Trudeau announced earlier this year a deal with Novavax to produce vaccines at a facility in Montreal, though that will not be operational until towards the end of the year.
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If the vaccine is approved before that, doses will need to be shipped from abroad.
“If vaccines are manufactured in the country, you have a lot more control,” said Dan Breznitz, co-director of the innovation policy lab at the University of Toronto.
Barring any “major catastrophe,” he said the government should be able to meet its September target to vaccinate a majority of Canadians, as more production facilities of vaccines will scale up elsewhere around the globe.
“Let’s hope that there isn’t any massive outbreak out there in Europe, India, the U.S.,” Breznitz added.
‘My nation first approach’
Growing “vaccine protectionism” and political tussles are also at play.
In late January, the European Union implemented a controversial export authorization scheme for COVID-19 vaccines, which requires EU-based vaccine manufacturers to seek approval from the national government, where their doses are produced, before exporting them out of the EU.
In an escalation of a high-profile row between the bloc and Anglo-Swedish company AstraZeneca over a delay in deliveries, Italy blocked 250,000 doses of their vaccine to Australia last week.
Some say this could possibly have ripple effects in Canada as well.
“If they can do it to Australia, they can do it to us,” said Amir Attaran, a professor of law and public health at the University of Ottawa.
1:44 Coronavirus: Australia asks European Commission to review decision by Italy to block AstraZeneca vaccine shipment
Coronavirus: Australia asks European Commission to review decision by Italy to block AstraZeneca vaccine shipment
Kohler said the “my nation first approach” that has been apparent since the beginning of the pandemic is heightening amid high global demand and a shortage in supply.
She said a “vacuum in terms of global health leadership” has only exacerbated the situation.
However, Timothy Chan, Canada Research Chair in Novel Optimization and Analytics in Health, is not concerned.
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“If they are blocking only a small number of vaccines or only to specific countries, I think the impact on Canada will be minimal,” he said.
Both Pfizer and AstraZeneca told Global News they did not anticipate any delays in their vaccine deliveries to Canada.
“We do not feel like we have any cause for concern related to the export of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine from Europe,” said Christina Antoniou, director of corporate affairs at Pfizer Canada, in an emailed statement.
Moderna and Johnson & Johnson did not respond to a request from Global News by the time of publication of this story.
2:28 Concerns growing over impact of EU vaccine export controls
Concerns growing over impact of EU vaccine export controls – Feb 1, 2021
The office of the minister of small business, export promotion and international trade also said that the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has given “repeated assurances” that the new EU measures will not affect vaccine shipments to Canada.
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“We will continue to work with the EU and its member states, as we have done throughout the pandemic, to ensure that our essential health and medical supply chains remain open and resilient,” a spokesperson told Global News.
NEW YORK (AP) — Teen smoking hit an all-time low in the U.S. this year, part of a big drop in the youth use of tobacco overall, the government reported Thursday.
There was a 20% drop in the estimated number of middle and high school students who recently used at least one tobacco product, including cigarettes, electronic cigarettes, nicotine pouches and hookahs. The number went from 2.8 million last year to 2.25 million this year — the lowest since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s key survey began in 1999.
“Reaching a 25-year low for youth tobacco product use is an extraordinary milestone for public health,” said Deirdre Lawrence Kittner, director of CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health, in a statement. However, “our mission is far from complete.”
A previously reported drop in vaping largely explains the overall decline in tobacco use from 10% to about 8% of students, health officials said.
The youth e-cigarette rate fell to under 6% this year, down from 7.7% last year — the lowest at any point in the last decade. E-cigarettes are the most commonly used tobacco products among teens, followed by nicotine pouches.
Use of other products has been dropping, too.
Twenty-five years ago, nearly 30% of high school students smoked. This year, it was just 1.7%, down from the 1.9%. That one-year decline is so small it is not considered statistically significant, but marks the lowest since the survey began 25 years ago. The middle school rate also is at its lowest mark.
Recent use of hookahs also dropped, from 1.1% to 0.7%.
The results come from an annual CDC survey, which included nearly 30,000 middle and high school students at 283 schools. The response rate this year was about 33%.
Officials attribute the declines to a number of measures, ranging from price increases and public health education campaigns to age restrictions and more aggressive enforcement against retailers and manufacturers selling products to kids.
Among high school students, use of any tobacco product dropped to 10%, from nearly 13% and e-cigarette use dipped under 8%, from 10%. But there was no change reported for middle school students, who less commonly vape or smoke or use other products,
Current use of tobacco fell among girls and Hispanic students, but rose among American Indian or Alaska Native students. And current use of nicotine pouches increased among white kids.
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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
WASHINGTON (AP) — An Alabama man was arrested Thursday for his alleged role in the January hack of a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission social media account that led the price of bitcoin to spike, the Justice Department said.
Eric Council Jr., 25, of Athens, is accused of helping to break into the SEC’s account on X, formerly known as Twitter, allowing the hackers to prematurely announce the approval of long-awaited bitcoin exchange-traded funds.
The price of bitcoin briefly spiked more than $1,000 after the post claimed “The SEC grants approval for #Bitcoin ETFs for listing on all registered national securities exchanges.”
But soon after the initial post appeared, SEC Chairman Gary Gensler said on his personal account that the SEC’s account was compromised. “The SEC has not approved the listing and trading of spot bitcoin exchange-traded products,” Gensler wrote, calling the post unauthorized without providing further explanation.
Authorities say Council carried out what’s known as a “SIM swap,” using a fake ID to impersonate someone with access to the SEC’s X account and convince a cellphone store to give him a SIM card linked to the person’s phone. Council was able to take over the person’s cellphone number and get access codes to the SEC’s X account, which he shared with others who broke into the account and sent the post, the Justice Department says.
Prosecutors say after Council returned the iPhone he used for the SIM swap, his online searches included: “What are the signs that you are under investigation by law enforcement or the FBI even if you have not been contacted by them.”
An email seeking comment was sent Thursday to an attorney for Council, who is charged in Washington’s federal court with conspiracy to commit aggravated identity theft and access device fraud.
The price of bitcoin swung from about $46,730 to just below $48,000 after the unauthorized post hit on Jan. 9 and then dropped to around $45,200 after the SEC’s denial. The SEC officially approved the first exchange-traded funds that hold bitcoin the following day.
Google, Meta and TikTok have removed social media accounts belonging to an industrial plant in Russia’s Tatarstan region aimed at recruiting young foreign women to make drones for Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
Posts on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok were taken down following an investigation by The Associated Press published Oct. 10 that detailed working conditions in the drone factory in the Alabuga Special Economic Zone, which is under U.S. and British sanctions.
Videos and other posts on the social media platforms promised the young women, who are largely from Africa, a free plane ticket to Russia and a salary of more than $500 a month following their recruitment via the program called “Alabuga Start.”
But instead of a work-study program in areas like hospitality and catering, some of them said they learned only arriving in the Tatarstan region that they would be toiling in a factory to make weapons of war, assembling thousands of Iranian-designed attack drones to be launched into Ukraine.
In interviews with AP, some of the women who worked in the complex complained of long hours under constant surveillance, of broken promises about wages and areas of study, and of working with caustic chemicals that left their skin pockmarked and itching. AP did not identify them by name or nationality out of concern for their safety.
The tech companies also removed accounts for Alabuga Polytechnic, a vocational boarding school for Russians aged 16-18 and Central Asians aged 18-22 that bills its graduates as experts in drone production.
The accounts collectively had at least 158,344 followers while one page on TikTok had more than a million likes.
In a statement, YouTube said its parent company Google is committed to sanctions and trade compliance and “after review and consistent with our policies, we terminated channels associated with Alabuga Special Economic Zone.”
Meta said it removed accounts on Facebook and Instagram that “violate our policies.” The company said it was committed to complying with sanctions laws and said it recognized that human exploitation is a serious problem which required a multifaceted approach, including at Meta.
It said it had teams dedicated to anti-trafficking efforts and aimed to remove those seeking to abuse its platforms.
TikTok said it removed videos and accounts which violated its community guidelines, which state it does not allow content that is used for the recruitment of victims, coordination of their transport, and their exploitation using force, fraud, coercion, or deception.
The women aged 18-22 were recruited to fill an urgent labor shortage in wartime Russia. They are from places like Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya, South Sudan, Sierra Leone and Nigeria, as well as the South Asian country of Sri Lanka. The drive also is expanding to elsewhere in Asia as well as Latin America.
Accounts affiliated to Alabuga with tens of thousands of followers are still accessible on Telegram, which did not reply to a request for comment. The plant’s management also did not respond to AP.
The Alabuga Start recruiting drive used a robust social media campaign of slickly edited videos with upbeat music that show African women smiling while cleaning floors, wearing hard hats while directing cranes, and donning protective equipment to apply paint or chemicals.
Videos also showed them enjoying Tatarstan’s cultural sites or playing sports. None of the videos made it clear the women would be working in a drone manufacturing complex.
Online, Alabuga promoted visits to the industrial area by foreign dignitaries, including some from Brazil, Sri Lanka and Burkina Faso.
In a since-deleted Instagram post, a Turkish diplomat who visited the plant had compared Alabuga Polytechnic to colleges in Turkey and pronounced it “much more developed and high-tech.”
According to Russian investigative outlets Protokol and Razvorot, some pupils at Alabuga Polytechnic are as young as 15 and have complained of poor working conditions.
Videos previously on the platforms showed the vocational school students in team-building exercises such as “military-patriotic” paintball matches and recreating historic Soviet battles while wearing camouflage.
Last month, Alabuga Start said on Telegram its “audience has grown significantly!”
That could be due to its hiring of influencers, who promoted the site on TikTok and Instagram as an easy way for young women to make money after leaving school.
TikTok removed two videos promoting Alabuga after publication of the AP investigation.
Experts told AP that about 90% of the women recruited via the Alabuga Start program work in drone manufacturing.
