The Canadian government has received requests for consular assistance from more than 100 citizens in China amid fears of the spread of a new coronavirus says Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne.
But he added officials have not yet determined whether to evacuate them.
2:09 Coronavirus outbreak: 126 Canadians in Hubei province have requested repatriation
Coronavirus outbreak: 126 Canadians in Hubei province have requested repatriation
In a scrum with reporters on Tuesday, Champagne said there are 250 Canadian citizens who have registered with Global Affairs Canada as being in China and that of those, 106 have requested aid in getting out as the new virus continues to spread.
“We’re trying to assess their specific needs for repatriation,” he said, noting it is currently the middle of the night in China which is complicating those efforts.
“We’re looking at all options to assist them. I’ll come back to you when I have more.”
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1:24 Coronavirus outbreak: Health Minister responds to new B.C. case
Coronavirus outbreak: Health Minister responds to new B.C. case
The U.S., France and other countries are preparing to evacuate their citizens from Chinese cities hit by the coronavirus.
But Canada has not yet announced plans to follow suit.
Champagne said the government is talking with other countries looking to evacuate their citizens and would not say whether the government was looking at sending an aircraft to get Canadians in need or if it would try to get them home on board aircraft from other evacuating countries.
Wuhan and most of Hubei, home to nearly 60 million people, has been placed under travel restrictions by China’s government as the number of cases in the country skyrocketed to over 4,500,
Global Affairs Canada also updated its travel advice warning citizens to completely avoid Hubei province.
2:34 Toronto sees first confirmed case, one presumptive case of coronavirus
Health experts say the decision to begin evacuations is complex and officials need to balance the risks people face on the ground in Wuhan with the possibility of importing more cases to Canada.
“Our public health system has to be ready do the kind of monitoring required for the people sent back here,” said Susy Hota, the medical director of infection prevention and control at the University Health Network in Toronto. “You don’t just want to pull the trigger … we have to be prepared.”
Andrew Morris, a professor in the department of medicine at the University of Toronto who studies infectious diseases, said this decision to airlift people out of the country is made more difficult by the lack of information about the situation in Wuhan.
“We don’t have a great understanding of the epidemiology of the disease,” he said. “When the number of cases are relatively small you can manage things pretty effectively on a case by case basis.”
If Canada were to move ahead with evacuations the individuals would be immediately place in quarantine, according to Morris.
1:44 Coronavirus outbreak: CDC says virus screenings in U.S. expanding to 20 airports
Coronavirus outbreak: CDC says virus screenings in U.S. expanding to 20 airports
“Even if they don’t really need to be, I would think there would way to much public pressure to not quarantine them,” he said.
Health Minister Patty Hajdu weighed in on those concerns in the scrum with Champagne.
She said consular officials are speaking to those Canadians requesting assistance to try to understand things like whether they have symptoms and whether they may have been exposed to the virus.
“We don’t know yet what the situation is of those individuals,” she said.
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Here’s a look at the evacuation plans from other countries:
– France’s first plane to repatriate nationals from Wuhan will leave Paris on Wednesday and return the next day. The flight will carry people with no symptoms, junior transport minister Jean-Baptiste Djebarri told television channel CNews. “These people will be put under quarantine. And then there will be a second flight, at a yet undefined date, with people showing symptoms.”
– South Korea plans to send charter flights this week to evacuate its citizens from Wuhan, Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said on Tuesday. The planes will arrive in the city as early as Thursday, he told a ministerial meeting aimed at discussing efforts to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus.
-Japan will send a charter flight to Wuhan on Tuesday night. Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi said the flight can carry around 200 passengers, but added about 650 citizens hope to return to Japan. Motegi said Tokyo is making arrangements for extra flights to Wuhan as early as Wednesday. Those with symptoms such as fever will be sent to hospital on landing at Tokyo’s Haneda airport.
-Kazakhstan has asked Beijing to allow 98 Kazakh students to leave the city of Wuhan.
-Germany will evacuate 90 citizens living in China’s Wuhan region.
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-Morocco will evacuate 100 citizens, mostly students, from the Wuhan area.
-The U.S. State Department said it will evacuate personnel from its Wuhan consulate to the United States and offer a limited number of seats to private U.S. citizens on a flight.
-Britain is talking to international partners to find solutions to help British and other foreign nationals leave Wuhan, a spokesman for Prime Minister Boris Johnson said.
-Russia has been in talks with China about evacuating its nationals from Wuhan and Hubei province, Russia’s embassy in China said.
-The Dutch government is assessing ways to evacuate 20 Dutch citizens from Wuhan, press agency ANP reported.
-Authorities in Myanmar said they had cancelled a planned evacuation of 60 students who were studying in Wuhan.
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
