The World Health Organization says it has cleared the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine for emergency use, meaning poorer countries may soon get access to the shot already available in Europe and North America.
Every country that has a drug regulatory agency will have to issue its own approval for any COVID-19 vaccine, but countries with weak systems usually rely on WHO to vet the shots.
The global body said late Thursday that the decision to issue its first emergency use validation for a COVID-19 vaccine “opens the door for countries to expedite their own regulatory approval processes to import and administer the vaccine.”
The UN health agency said its review found the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, which has already received clearance in the United States, Britain, Canada, the European Union and a dozen other countries, “met the must-have criteria for safety and efficacy set out by WHO.”
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has to be stored at ultra-frozen temperatures, a big hurdle for developing countries where the required freezers and reliable electricity supply may not be available.
“This requirement makes the vaccine more challenging to deploy in settings where ultra-cold chain equipment may not be available or reliably accessible,” WHO said, adding that it was “working to support countries in assessing their delivery plans and preparing for use where possible.”
What’s happening across Canada
WATCH | Mandatory COVID-19 tests add turbulence between airlines, Ottawa:
The federal government has set Jan. 7 as the date when airline passengers will require a negative COVID-19 test before entering Canada. The decision has added turbulence to the already fraught relationship between Ottawa and the airlines. 1:56
Quebec, the hardest-hit province in Canada, exceeded 200,000 COVID-19 infections on Thursday after reporting a record 2,819 new cases — a record single-day high.
Health officials in the province also reported 62 more deaths attributed to the novel coronavirus, bringing the provincial death toll to 8,226. Hospitalizations stood at 1,175 with 165 people in intensive care units.
Quebec also said Thursday that it’s changing its COVID-19 vaccine strategy in order to vaccinate as many people as possible instead of holding doses back for booster shots — a practice already in place in several other provinces.
As of Thursday, the province had received 87,000 doses of vaccine and has administered 29,250 injections.
Quebec wasn’t the only province to shatter its single-day COVID-19 case record on Thursday — Ontario reported 3,328 cases of COVID-19, becoming the first province to report more than 3,000 cases in a single day.
As of early Friday morning, Canada’s COVID-19 case count stood at 580,195, with 74,777 of those cases considered active. A CBC News tally of deaths stood at 15,605.
British Columbia’s provincial health officer on Thursday urged people to start 2021 by following COVID-19 precautions to prevent a surge in cases similar to those in other jurisdictions.
Dr. Bonnie Henry said persistence under adversity during 2020 has helped save lives, but some sacrifices must continue before more people can be vaccinated. She said 17,510 people in every region of the province have had their first dose of a vaccine, mostly the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.
Here’s a look at what’s happening with COVID-19 across the country:
-From The Canadian Press and CBC News, last updated at 7 a.m. ET
What’s happening in the U.S.
Hundreds of people waited in line at Lakes Park Regional Library to receive the COVID-19 vaccine in Fort Myers, Fla., earlier this week. (Andrew West/The News-Press/USA Today Network/Reuters)
Florida health authorities late Thursday reported finding evidence of the latest U.S. case of the new and apparently more contagious coronavirus strain first seen in England, saying it was detected in a man with no recent travel history.
The case, disclosed in a Florida Health Department statement tweeted on its HealthyFla site, comes after reports in recent days of two individual cases of the new strain of COVID-19 discovered in Colorado and California.
Florida’s health statement said the new virus variant was detected in a man in his 20s in Martin County, which abuts the Atlantic Coast above densely populated South Florida. The health department did not give further details, such as releasing the man’s medical condition or how the strain was detected.
California on Wednesday announced the nation’s second confirmed case of the new virus strain. The announcement came 24 hours after word of the first reported variant infection in the U.S., which emerged in Colorado — in a National Guardsman who had been sent to help out at a nursing home struggling with an outbreak.
Scientists in the U.K. believe the variant is more contagious than previously identified strains. The cases have triggered questions about how the version circulating in England arrived in the U.S. and whether it is too late to stop it now, with top experts saying it is probably already spreading elsewhere in the United States.
Medical staff member Diana Isabel Escalante talks to a patient in the COVID-19 intensive care unit on New Year’s Eve at the United Memorial Medical Center on in Houston, Texas. (Go Nakamura/Getty Images)
The U.S. has been dealing with rising case numbers and a vaccination effort that hasn’t moved forward as quickly as officials hoped. More than 19.9 million cases of COVID-19 have been reported in the U.S. and the country has seen more than 345,000 deaths.
In Wisconsin, authorities arrested a suburban Milwaukee pharmacist Thursday suspected of deliberately ruining hundreds of doses of coronavirus vaccine by removing them from refrigeration. Police in Grafton, about 32 kilometres north of Milwaukee, said the Advocate Aurora Health pharmacist was arrested on suspicion of reckless endangerment, adulterating a prescription drug and criminal damage to property, all felonies.
The pharmacist has been fired and police said in a news release that he was in jail. Police did not identify the pharmacist, saying he has not yet been formally charged. His motive remains unclear. Police said that detectives believe he knew the spoiled doses would be useless and people who received them would mistakenly think they’d been vaccinated when they hadn’t.
-From The Associated Press, last updated at 7:20 a.m. ET
What’s happening around the world
A sign that reads ‘Happy Year 2021’ is seen inside an intensive care unit where patients with COVID-19 are treated at Hospital General on New Year’s Eve in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. (Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters)
As of early Friday morning, more than 83.5 million cases of COVID-19 had been reported worldwide with more than 47.1 million cases considered recovered or resolved, according to Johns Hopkins University’s tracking tool. The global death toll stood at more than 1.8 million.
In Europe, British medics warned Friday that hospitals around the country face a perilous few weeks amid surging new coronavirus infections that have been blamed on a new variant of the virus.
A day after the U.K. posted a record 55,892 new infections and another 964 coronavirus-related deaths, concerns are mounting about the impact on the overstretched National Health Service. Field hospitals that were constructed in the early days of the pandemic but that were subsequently mothballed are being reactivated.
The Royal College of Nursing’s England director, Mike Adams, told Sky News that the U.K. was in the “eye of the storm” and that it was “infuriating” to see people not following physical distancing guidance or wearing masks.
A leading physician also warned of burnout among health workers on the front line of the outbreak in hospitals, while also urging people to follow the rules.
“I am worried,” Adrian Boyle, vice-president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, told the BBC. “We are very much at battle stations.”
New infections have more than doubled in recent weeks after a new variant that health experts have said appears to be significantly more contagious was found to be behind a big spike in cases around London and the southeast of England.
Given the lags between new cases and hospitalizations and subsequent deaths, there are huge concerns about the path of the pandemic over the coming month or two in a country that has Europe’s second-highest virus-related death toll at nearly 74,000.
As a result of the spike, which has spread around the country and seen lockdown restrictions tightened, the strategy around the rollout of vaccines has been changed to get more people an initial jab as soon as possible, with a scheduled second one delayed.
In a joint statement Thursday, the chief medical officers for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, said the first vaccine dose offers “substantial” protection.
Currently, two vaccines have been approved for use in the U.K.
Just under 1 million people have received the first dose of the vaccine developed by American pharmaceutical firm Pfizer and German biotechnology company BioNTech, with a small minority also getting the second dose as planned after 21 days.
In the Asia-Pacific region, the Philippines will prohibit the entry of foreign travelers from the United States effective Jan. 3, President Rodrigo Duterte’s spokesperson said on Friday, after the more infectious new variant of the coronavirus was detected in Florida.
The travel ban, until Jan. 15, covers those who have been to the United States within 14 days preceding arrival in the Philippines, spokesperson Harry Roque said in a statement. The measure expands the travel restriction that Manila announced on Tuesday, which initially covered passengers from 19 countries and territories — including Canada — and took effect as of midnight on Dec. 29.
Due to <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/COVID19?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#COVID19</a>, the <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/Philippines?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#Philippines</a> is not allowing entry to travellers arriving from <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/Canada?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#Canada</a>, from December 30 to January 15. These restrictions could be extended.<br> <a href=”https://t.co/l6c54LdZ9O”>https://t.co/l6c54LdZ9O</a> <a href=”https://t.co/PWvvaiy6ax”>pic.twitter.com/PWvvaiy6ax</a>
Two major airports in northeastern China are requiring departing passengers to show a negative coronavirus test taken over the previous 72 hours before they can board their planes.
The requirements by the Shenyang and Dalian come amid a small but persistent growth in cases in the two cities located in Liaoning province just north of the capital Beijing. Four new cases were announced Friday in Liaoning, along with another five cases in Beijing, where emergency testing was ordered for more than a million people following the detection of a small cluster in the northeastern suburbs.
Wary of another wave of infections, China is urging tens of millions of migrant workers to stay put during next month’s annual Lunar New Year holiday.
A woman checks her temperature as she visits a popular entertainment street to celebrate New Year’s Eve in Bangkok during the coronavirus pandemic in Thailand. (Soe Zeya Tun/Reuters)
The Thai capital is shutting down venues including schools and entertainment parks as coronavirus cases continue to spread. Thailand reported 279 new cases on Friday including two deaths.
In the Americas, Brazil reported more than 1,000 deaths from the coronavirus for a third day in a row. Brazil has seen more than 7.6 million cases of COVID-19 and nearly 195,000 deaths.
In Africa, Chad has locked down its capital N’djamena for the first time since the outbreak of the pandemic and has declared a dusk to dawn curfew due to a rise in infections.
In the Middle East, Israel said it has vaccinated 1 million people against COVID-19, more than a tenth of its population, as it rolls out one of the world’s earliest and most rapid inoculation campaigns.
Iranian media said Thursday the country is negotiating the purchase of coronavirus vaccines from China. The semiofficial ISNA news agency quoted Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s chief of staff Mahmoud Vaezi as saying: “We are reaching agreement with China for buying 4 million doses.”
Vaezi said the process would take around two months. Iran has already discussed buying vaccines from both Russia and India. China on Thursday authorized the Sinopharm vaccine for general use, after it had already approved its use earlier to health-care professionals and essential workers under emergency-use guidelines. Vaezi said Iran will also buy 16.5 vaccines from COVAX, the global vaccine consortium.
-From The Associated Press and Reuters, last updated at 8:25 a.m. ET
OTTAWA – Treasury Board President Anita Anand has been sworn in as federal transport minister at a ceremony at Rideau Hall, taking over a portfolio left vacant after Pablo Rodriguez resigned from cabinet and the Liberal caucus on Thursday.
Anand thanked Rodriguez for his contributions to the government and the country, saying she’s grateful for his guidance and friendship.
She sidestepped a question about the message it sends to have him leave the federal Liberal fold.
“That is a decision that he made independently, and I wish him well,” she said.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was not present for the swearing-in ceremony, nor were any other members of the Liberal government.
The shakeup in cabinet comes just days after the Liberals lost a key seat in a Montreal byelection to the Bloc Québécois and amid renewed calls for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to step down and make way for a new leader.
Anand said she is not actively seeking leadership of the party, saying she is focused on her roles as minister and as MP.
“My view is that we are a team, and we are a team that has to keep delivering for our country,” she said.
The minority Liberal government is in a more challenging position in the House of Commons after the NDP ended a supply-and-confidence deal that provided parliamentary stability for more than two years.
Non-confidence votes are guaranteed to come from the Opposition Conservatives, who are eager to bring the government down.
On Thursday morning, Rodriguez made a symbolic walk over the Alexandra Bridge from Parliament Hill to Gatineau, Que., where he formally announced his plans to run for the Quebec Liberal party leadership.
He said he will now sit as an Independent member of Parliament, which will allow him to focus on his own priorities.
“I was defending the priorities of the government, and I did it in a very loyal way,” he said.
“It’s normal and it’s what I had to do. But now it’s more about my vision, the vision of the team that I’m building.”
Rodriguez said he will stay on as an MP until the Quebec Liberal leadership campaign officially launches in January.
He said that will “avoid a costly byelection a few weeks, or months, before a general election.”
The next federal election must be held by October 2025.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said he will try to topple the government sooner than that, beginning with a non-confidence motion that is set to be debated Sept. 24 and voted on Sept. 25.
Poilievre has called on the NDP and the Bloc Québécois to support him, but both Jagmeet Singh and Yves-François Blanchet have said they will not support the Conservatives.
Rodriguez said he doesn’t want a federal election right away and will vote against the non-confidence motion.
As for how he would vote on other matters before the House of Commons, “it would depend on the votes.”
Public Services and Procurement Minister Jean-Yves Duclos will become the government’s new Quebec lieutenant, a non-cabinet role Rodriguez held since 2019.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
— With files from Nojoud Al Mallees and Dylan Robertson
OTTAWA – Several federal political parties are expressing reservations about the prospect of fresh regulations to prevent foreign meddlers from tainting their candidate nomination processes.
Elections Canada has suggested possible changes to safeguard nominations, including barring non-citizens from helping choose candidates, requiring parties to publish contest rules and explicitly outlawing behaviour such as voting more than once.
However, representatives of the Bloc Québécois, Green Party and NDP have told a federal commission of inquiry into foreign interference that such changes may be unwelcome, difficult to implement or counterproductive.
The Canada Elections Act currently provides for limited regulation of federal nomination races and contestants.
For instance, only contestants who accept $1,000 in contributions or incur $1,000 in expenses have to file a financial return. In addition, the act does not include specific obligations concerning candidacy, voting, counting or results reporting other than the identity of the successful nominee.
A report released in June by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians expressed concern about how easily foreign actors can take advantage of loopholes and vulnerabilities to support preferred candidates.
Lucy Watson, national director of the NDP, told the inquiry Thursday she had concerns about the way in which new legislation would interact with the internal decision-making of the party.
“We are very proud of the fact that our members play such a significant role in shaping the internal policies and procedures and infrastructure of the party, and I would not want to see that lost,” she said.
“There are guidelines, there are best practices that we would welcome, but if we were to talk about legal requirements and legislation, that’s something I would have to take away and put further thought into, and have discussions with folks who are integral to the party’s governance.”
In an August interview with the commission of inquiry, Bloc Québécois executive director Mathieu Desquilbet said the party would be opposed to any external body monitoring nomination and leadership contest rules.
A summary tabled Thursday says Desquilbet expressed doubts about the appropriateness of requiring nomination candidates to file a full financial report with Elections Canada, saying the agency’s existing regulatory framework and the Bloc’s internal rules on the matter are sufficient.
Green Party representatives Jon Irwin and Robin Marty told the inquiry in an August interview it would not be realistic for an external body, like Elections Canada, to administer nomination or leadership contests as the resources required would exceed the federal agency’s capacity.
A summary of the interview says Irwin and Marty “also did not believe that rules violations could effectively be investigated by an external body like the Office of the Commissioner of Canada Elections.”
“The types of complaints that get raised during nomination contests can be highly personal, politically driven, and could overwhelm an external body.”
Marty, national campaign director for the party, told the inquiry Thursday that more reporting requirements would also place an administrative burden on volunteers and riding workers.
In addition, he said that disclosing the vote tally of a nomination contest could actually help foreign meddlers by flagging the precise number of ballots needed for a candidate to be chosen.
Irwin, interim executive director of the Greens, said the ideal tactic for a foreign country would be working to get someone in a “position of power” within a Canadian political party.
He said “the bad guys are always a step ahead” when it comes to meddling in the Canadian political process.
In May, David Vigneault, director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service at the time, said it was very clear from the design of popular social media app TikTok that data gleaned from its users is available to the Chinese government.
A December 2022 CSIS memo tabled at the inquiry Thursday said TikTok “has the potential to be exploited” by Beijing to “bolster its influence and power overseas, including in Canada.”
Asked about the app, Marty told the inquiry the Greens would benefit from more “direction and guidance,” given the party’s lack of resources to address such things.
Representatives of the Liberal and Conservative parties are slated to appear at the inquiry Friday, while chief electoral officer Stéphane Perrault is to testify at a later date.
After her party representatives appeared Thursday, Green Leader Elizabeth May told reporters it was important for all party leaders to work together to come up with acceptable rules.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
OTTAWA – The Métis Nation of Saskatchewan has pulled out of a national body representing Métis, citing problems with an Ontario group and throwing the future of the Métis National Council into question.
In a resolution passed Thursday morning, the Saskatchewan group says the Métis Nation of Ontario, which is a member of the national body, accepts and continues to represent people who are not Métis.
“The Métis National Council has increasingly been used for advocacy purposes that are inconsistent with its original mandate and vision, diverting from the foundational role of representing Métis rights and self-determination,” the resolution says.
It also says the Métis National Council has failed to ensure the integrity of the Ontario group’s citizenship registry and has not rectified problems, despite constant calls to do so.
The resolution says its continued association with the Métis Nation of Ontario “no longer benefits the Métis Nation within Saskatchewan or the Métis Nation as a whole.”
The Métis Nation of Ontario did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but has previously defended its citizenship registry as being legitimate.
The departure of the Saskatchewan group comes years after the Manitoba Métis Federation withdrew from the council, citing similar concerns about the Métis Nation of Ontario.
“This was not a decision our government made lightly but one we felt necessary. Our (Métis Nation of Saskatchewan) government and our Métis communities need to have control over our identity and culture while making decisions that align with the values of our Saskatchewan Métis Nation,” said president Glen McCallum in a statement on Thursday.
The Métis National Council was, until Thursday, comprised of the Métis Nation of Saskatchewan, the Métis Nation of Alberta, the Métis Nation of Ontario and the Métis Nation of British Columbia.
The Saskatchewan group was a founding member of the national body, along with the Alberta group and the Manitoba Métis Federation.
According to the national council’s bylaws, quorum for its board of governors meetings must include two of the founding members. As of now only one remains, bringing into question the future of the organization, which often works with the federal government and advocates internationally for Métis.
Will Goodon, who serves as the Manitoba Métis Federation’s housing minister, said the national body is “dead today.”
“A meeting cannot be held. And they cannot change the bylaws without having a board of governors meeting,” he wrote on X.
Métis National Council president Cassidy Caron announced earlier this year she would not be seeking re-election, leaving an open contest for someone to fill her post.
The board voted to postpone and reschedule a September vote and general assembly to November. Caron said in a newsletter that her term will end on Sept. 30 either way.
The Saskatchewan group had already pulled support for federal legislation that would enshrine its self-government over concerns about the Métis Nation of Ontario and the Métis Nation of Alberta, which were also included.
McCallum said in April the legislation was holding the group back, and that they needed to put the needs of Métis in Saskatchewan first.
First Nations chiefs in Ontario and the Manitoba Métis Federation consistently raised concerns about the Ontario group as the legislation was being studied by a House of Commons committee, with Métis Nation of Ontario president Margaret Froh billing the self-government process as the longest in Canadian history.
First Nations chiefs in Ontario have accused the federal government of overstepping its jurisdiction and alleged the legislation infringes on their rights.
The Assembly of First Nations, which represents some 630 chiefs across Canada, passed a resolution calling for the federal government to kill the legislation altogether. The AFN’s concerns are mainly focused on six new communities the Métis Nation of Ontario and the province recognized in 2017, which it says have no historical basis to exist.
The Manitoba Métis Federation has also opposed the extension of self-government to the Métis Nation of Ontario, saying the Ontario group’s membership is not on par with its definition of Métis.
The Métis Nation of Ontario has disputed that, pushing back against the idea Métis only exist around the Red River in Manitoba.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.
