Several provinces have again set new highs in COVID-19 cases, reporting on the first day of 2022 that the highly transmissible Omicron variant continued to drive up infections across Canada.
Ontario on Saturday reported 18,445 cases — an increase from 16,713 new cases reported New Year’s Eve.
Infectious disease experts have said for several days that the actual number of new cases is likely far higher than those reported each day because many public health units in Ontario have reached testing capacity.
The provincial public health department said 12 more people have died due to the virus and 85 more people were in hospital.
WATCH | Nurse reacts to Ontario’s decision to stop reporting COVID-19 cases in schools:
Ontario nurse reacts to province’s decision to stop reporting COVID-19 cases in schools
7 hours ago
Duration 8:48
Doris Grinspun, head of the Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario, responds to news that the Ministry of Education would be suspending the reporting of COVID-19 cases in schools and child-care centres. 8:48
Quebec reported 17,122 new cases, marking the fifth straight day a record number of new infections have been reported in the province. It also recorded eight additional deaths.
Outdoor New Year’s Eve celebrations in the province were prohibited as of 10 p.m. ET because a curfew, lasting until 5 a.m., went into effect on Friday. The curfew is Quebec’s second of the pandemic. A previous curfew, announced in early January 2021, was in place for nearly five months.
New restrictions also include banning nearly all indoor gatherings and the closing of restaurant dining rooms. Indoor gatherings involving more than one household bubble have been prohibited.
WATCH | Exhaustion as Quebec’s COVID-19 curfew comes into force on New Year’s Eve:
Exhaustion as Quebec’s COVID-19 curfew comes into force on New Year’s Eve
23 hours ago
Duration 2:17
Quebec residents are frustrated and exhausted as the province’s latest round of COVID-19 restrictions — including a renewed curfew — come into effect on New Year’s Eve. 2:17
The news came shortly after the Canadiens lost 5-2 to the Florida Panthers in Sunrise on Saturday. Montreal dressed only 11 forwards and five defencemen for the game. Forward Jake Evans and defenceman Alexander Romanov were added to the protocol list just hours earlier, giving the Habs 16 players now in isolation.
Records were also set on Saturday in Nunavut, which reported 50 new cases, and Newfoundland and Labrador, which logged 442 new infections.
In Newfoundland and Labrador, Health Minister John Haggie said he had tested positive for COVID-19 and was isolating with cold-like symptoms.
NL’s health minister says he has COVID-19 and isolating with cold like symptoms <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/covid19nfld?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#covid19nfld</a> <a href=”https://t.co/HkAhkOTsSI”>pic.twitter.com/HkAhkOTsSI</a>
The province’s surge in cases will affect health-care services in St. John’s. Eastern Health says non-urgent services will be temporarily scaled back as of Tuesday to allow for a greater focus on booster vaccine clinics and testing for COVID-19. The health authority says it plans to focus on urgent or emergent acute care services within the city.
However, prenatal appointments will continue, as will those for cancer treatment. The medical imaging program will be performing exams on a priority basis, and those patients will be contacted only if their appointment has been cancelled, Eastern Health said in a statement issued Friday. All non-urgent appointments have been cancelled, it said.
Boosting vaccination efforts is one of the country’s top priorities as 2021 turns to 2022, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in his year-end statement on Friday.
Trudeau said Canadians will need to continue working together to end the pandemic, adding that the “strength, determination and compassion” they’ve demonstrated over the past year will “keep inspiring and guiding us in the new year.”
What’s happening across Canada
WATCH | Provinces shift strategies in attempt to counter Omicron’s rapid spread:
Provinces shift strategies in attempt to counter Omicron’s rapid spread
24 hours ago
Duration 2:02
Provinces are shifting their COVID-19 strategies as the Omicron variant sweeps through Canada at record-breaking speed. More provinces have shortened isolation periods, while Ontario has stopped trying to track and trace its cases, as labs report testing backlogs. 2:02
On the last day of 2021, nearly every province reported record-breaking daily numbers for new cases of COVID-19.
British Columbia was no exception, reporting 3,795 new cases of COVID-19 and three more deaths on Friday. Dr. Bonnie Henry, the province’s public health officer, said earlier in the week that the true number of cases is likely higher because B.C. had reached its maximum capacity on testing and contact tracing.
The province also announced it is limiting visits to long-term care facilities to essential visitors and will fast track its booster program.
In the Prairies, Manitoba reported a single-day high of 1,494 new cases on Friday, as well as five new deaths. Saskatchewan reported 735 new cases on Friday, another daily high. (Alberta did not announce new numbers; it will resume regular reporting on Tuesday.)
In Atlantic Canada, Prince Edward Island reported a record 175 new cases on Friday. New Brunswick also reported a daily high of 682 new infections — a number Health Minister Dorothy Shephard said could rise to 1,000 a day within a week.
Shephard also said the province could see more than 160 COVID-19 patients in hospitals by mid-January, a scenario she warned “would very quickly overwhelm” health-care providers.
Nova Scotia reported 618 new cases on Friday. Starting next week, the province will accelerate its descending age-based approach for boosters to include those 30 years and older.
In North, the Northwest Territories, which is delaying a return to school, reported 42 new cases on Friday. Yukon reported 26 new cases and one additional death.
B.C., Manitoba, Alberta and New Brunswick on Friday became the latest provinces to reduce the number of days people with two doses of vaccine must isolate if they get COVID-19. The isolation period has come down from 10 days to five for those individuals.
Ontario and Saskatchewan both announced on Thursday that they were reducing the isolation period to five days for double-vaccinated people with positive test results.
For Ontario and Saskatchewan, the changes were immediate. For B.C. and Manitoba, the new measures start on Jan. 1. Alberta’s change takes effect Jan. 3, with New Brunswick set to implement the measure on Jan. 4.
What’s happening around the world
As of Saturday, roughly 289.1 million cases of COVID-19 had been reported worldwide, according to Johns Hopkins University’s coronavirus tracker. The reported global death toll stood at more than 5.4 million.
In the Americas, the annual Rose Parade returned to the streets of Pasadena, Calif., with marching bands and floral floats after being cancelled last year due to the pandemic. The crowd was smaller than in previous years, but the parade still drew thousands of fans along its 8.8-kilometre route.
Rose Queen Nadia Chung, centre, waves to the crowd at the 133rd Rose Parade in Pasadena, Calif., on Saturday. (Michael Owen Baker/The Associated Press)
The parade and the afternoon Rose Bowl football game between the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Utah Utes remained on track despite an explosion of COVID-19 infections in Los Angeles County, where daily new cases topped 27,000 on Friday.
In the Asia-Pacific region, China ended the final week of 2021 with its biggest tally of local COVID-19 cases for any seven-day period since it largely contained the country’s first epidemic nearly two years ago.
The National Health Commission on Saturday reported 175 new community infections with confirmed clinical symptoms for Dec. 31, bringing the total number of local symptomatic cases in China in the past week to 1,151, driven mostly by an outbreak in the northwestern industrial and tech hub of Xi’an.
Xi’an has been under lockdown for 10 days as of Saturday.
A man undergoes a test for COVID-19 in Xi’an, in China’s northern Shaanxi province, on Wednesday. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)
In the Middle East, the United Arab Emirates will ban non-vaccinated citizens from travelling abroad from Jan. 10, the country’s state news agency WAM reported on Saturday, citing the Foreign Affairs Ministry and the National Emergency Crisis and Disaster Management Authority.
The report said that fully vaccinated citizens would also require a booster shot to be eligible to travel. The ban would not apply to those with medical or humanitarian exemptions.
In Europe, Pope Francis delivered a New Year’s message on Saturday in which he acknowledged that the coronavirus pandemic has left many scared and struggling amid economic inequality.
“We are still living in uncertain and difficult times due to the pandemic,” Francis said. “Many are frightened about the future and burdened by social problems, personal problems, dangers stemming from the ecological crisis, injustices and by global economic imbalances.”
Pope Francis adresses the crowd from the window of the Apostolic Palace overlooking Saint Peter’s Square during the New Year Angelus prayer at the Vatican on Saturday. (Tiziana Fabi/AFP via Getty Images)
Thousands of Rome residents and tourists, wearing face masks as protection against the spread of the coronavirus, gathered in St. Peter’s Square on a sunny, mild day to hear the Pope lay out his recipe for world peace, cheering his appearance.
In Africa, businesses working in Morocco’s key tourism sector say the country’s tough COVID-19 restrictions, including a full flight ban, are undermining its competitiveness compared with rival destinations.
Morocco shut its borders in late November and will only reopen them at the end of January. It also banned New Year’s Eve celebrations and is enforcing its vaccine pass requirements more strictly in response to the Omicron variant of the coronavirus.
“These restrictions are unjustified and they have made Morocco lose tourists to Mediterranean competitors such as Egypt and Turkey,” said Lahcen Zelmat, head of Morocco’s hotel federation.
Morocco is Africa’s most vaccinated country, having now administered two shots to 23 million people, in a total population of 36 million. Nearly three million have also had booster shots.
MONTREAL – The employers association at the Port of Montreal has issued the dockworkers’ union a “final, comprehensive offer,” threatening to lock out workers at 9 p.m. Sunday if a deal isn’t reached.
The Maritime Employers Association says its new offer includes a three per cent salary increase per year for four years and a 3.5 per cent increase for the two subsequent years. It says the offer would bring the total average compensation package of a longshore worker at the Port of Montreal to more than $200,000 per year at the end of the contract.
“The MEA agrees to this significant compensation increase in view of the availability required from its employees,” it wrote Thursday evening in a news release.
The association added that it is asking longshore workers to provide at least one hour’s notice when they will be absent from a shift — instead of one minute — to help reduce management issues “which have a major effect on daily operations.”
Syndicat des débardeurs du port de Montréal, which represents nearly 1,200 longshore workers, launched a partial unlimited strike on Oct. 31, which has paralyzed two terminals that represent 40 per cent of the port’s total container handling capacity.
A complete strike on overtime, affecting the whole port, began on Oct. 10.
The union has said it will accept the same increases that were granted to its counterparts in Halifax or Vancouver — 20 per cent over four years. It is also concerned with scheduling and work-life balance. Workers have been without a collective agreement since Dec. 31, 2023.
Only essential services and activities unrelated to longshoring will continue at the port after 9 p.m. Sunday in the event of a lockout, the employer said.
The ongoing dispute has had major impacts at Canada’s second-biggest port, which moves some $400 million in goods every day.
On Thursday, Montreal port authority CEO Julie Gascon reiterated her call for federal intervention to end the dispute, which has left all container handling capacity at international terminals at “a standstill.”
“I believe that the best agreements are negotiated at the table,” she said in a news release. “But let’s face it, there are no negotiations, and the government must act by offering both sides a path to true industrial peace.”
Federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon issued a statement Thursday, prior to the lockout notice, in which he criticized the slow pace of talks at the ports in Montreal and British Columbia, where more than 700 unionized port workers have been locked out since Nov. 4.
“Both sets of talks are progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved,” he wrote on the X social media platform.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
HALIFAX – Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says it’s “disgraceful and demeaning” that a Halifax-area school would request that service members not wear military uniforms to its Remembrance Day ceremony.
Houston’s comments were part of a chorus of criticism levelled at the school — Sackville Heights Elementary — whose administration decided to back away from the plan after the outcry.
A November newsletter from the school in Middle Sackville, N.S., invited Armed Forces members to attend its ceremony but asked that all attendees arrive in civilian attire to “maintain a welcoming environment for all.”
Houston, who is currently running for re-election, accused the school’s leaders of “disgracing themselves while demeaning the people who protect our country” in a post on the social media platform X Thursday night.
“If the people behind this decision had a shred of the courage that our veterans have, this cowardly and insulting idea would have been rejected immediately,” Houston’s post read. There were also several calls for resignations within the school’s administration attached to Houston’s post.
In an email to families Thursday night, the school’s principal, Rachael Webster, apologized and welcomed military family members to attend “in the attire that makes them most comfortable.”
“I recognize this request has caused harm and I am deeply sorry,” Webster’s email read, adding later that the school has the “utmost respect for what the uniform represents.”
Webster said the initial request was out of concern for some students who come from countries experiencing conflict and who she said expressed discomfort with images of war, including military uniforms.
Her email said any students who have concerns about seeing Armed Forces members in uniform can be accommodated in a way that makes them feel safe, but she provided no further details in the message.
Webster did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At a news conference Friday, Houston said he’s glad the initial request was reversed but said he is still concerned.
“I can’t actually fathom how a decision like that was made,” Houston told reporters Friday, adding that he grew up moving between military bases around the country while his father was in the Armed Forces.
“My story of growing up in a military family is not unique in our province. The tradition of service is something so many of us share,” he said.
“Saying ‘lest we forget’ is a solemn promise to the fallen. It’s our commitment to those that continue to serve and our commitment that we will pass on our respects to the next generation.”
Liberal Leader Zach Churchill also said he’s happy with the school’s decision to allow uniformed Armed Forces members to attend the ceremony, but he said he didn’t think it was fair to question the intentions of those behind the original decision.
“We need to have them (uniforms) on display at Remembrance Day,” he said. “Not only are we celebrating (veterans) … we’re also commemorating our dead who gave the greatest sacrifice for our country and for the freedoms we have.”
NDP Leader Claudia Chender said that while Remembrance Day is an important occasion to honour veterans and current service members’ sacrifices, she said she hopes Houston wasn’t taking advantage of the decision to “play politics with this solemn occasion for his own political gain.”
“I hope Tim Houston reached out to the principal of the school before making a public statement,” she said in a statement.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
VANCOUVER – Employers and the union representing supervisors embroiled in a labour dispute that triggered a lockout at British Columbia’s ports will attempt to reach a deal when talks restart this weekend.
A spokesman from the office of federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon has confirmed the minister spoke with leaders at both the BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514, but did not invoke any section of the Canadian Labour Code that would force them back to talks.
A statement from the ministry says MacKinnon instead “asked them to return to the negotiation table,” and talks are now scheduled to start on Saturday with the help of federal mediators.
A meeting notice obtained by The Canadian Press shows talks beginning in Vancouver at 5 p.m. and extendable into Sunday and Monday, if necessary.
The lockout at B.C. ports by employers began on Monday after what their association describes as “strike activity” from the union. The result was a paralysis of container cargo traffic at terminals across Canada’s west coast.
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint against the employers for allegedly bargaining in bad faith, a charge that employers call a “meritless claim.”
The two sides have been without a deal since March 2023, and the employers say its final offer presented last week in the last round of talks remains on the table.
The proposed agreement includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term along with an average lump sum payment of $21,000 per qualified worker.
The union has said one of its key concerns is the advent of port automation in cargo operations, and workers want assurances on staffing levels regardless of what technology is being used at the port.
The disruption is happening while two container terminals are shut down in Montreal in a separate labour dispute.
It leaves container cargo traffic disrupted at Canada’s two biggest ports, Vancouver and Montreal, both operating as major Canadian trade gateways on the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.
This is one of several work disruptions at the Port of Vancouver, where a 13-day strike stopped cargo last year, while labour strife in the rail and grain-handling sectors led to further disruptions earlier this year.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
