Italy is making life more uncomfortable for unvaccinated people as the holidays draw near, excluding them from indoor restaurants, theatres and museums to reduce the spread of coronavirus and encourage vaccine skeptics to get their shots.
Starting Monday through Jan. 15, Italian police can check whether diners in restaurants or bars have a “super” green health pass certifying that they are either vaccinated or have recently recovered from the virus. Smartphone applications that check people’s health pass status will be updated and those who have merely tested negative in recent days for COVID-19 will no longer be allowed into concerts, movies or performances.
The number of new COVID-19 infections in Italy has been on a gradual rise for the past six weeks, even before concerns arose about the new omicron variant. That’s a worrying trend as Italians plan holiday parties and getaways to spend time with friends and family. Christmas travel and holiday gatherings were strictly limited last year due to a steeper rise in contagion.
While both Germany and Austria are moving toward making vaccines obligatory, Italy is instead tightening restrictions on the unvaccinated at the most convivial time of the year — while allowing those who are vaccinated to go about life more or less as usual.
People walk along the Via Condotti luxury shopping street in central Rome on Sunday as the city brought in a regulation requiring people to wear masks outdoors in the city centre and in other busy shopping areas until Dec. 31. (Vincenzo Pinto/AFP/Getty Images)
Italy’s vaccination rate is higher than many of its neighbours, at 85 per cent of the eligible population aged 12 and older and 77 per cent of the total population. But people in their 30s, 40s and 50s have proved the most reluctant to get vaccinated, with nearly 3.5 million still not having received their first doses.
They are also the same age group that is now being hardest hit by the virus, according to Silvio Brusaferro, head of Italy’s National Health Institute.
Also starting Monday, people must have a health pass to access local public transportation and stay in hotels — that can be acquired also with a negative recent test. In Milan, the prefect said health passes will be checked before people are allowed onto the subway or buses.
With the holiday shopping season heating up, many cities including Rome and Milan have ordered mask mandates even outdoors.
Public health officials say vaccinations, along with prudent public behaviour including wearing masks in crowds, are key to reducing infection levels as winter weather pushes more activities indoors. They credit Italy’s relatively high level of immunization as one reason that the infection curve is not as steep as last winter, when broad restrictions were imposed with the spread of the delta variant.
“It is clear that after two years of the pandemic, we cannot easily close schools to physical classes and shut down economic activity,” said Gianni Rezza, the health ministry’s director of prevention.
“Therefore, you can try to keep the virus spread down with measures that are sustainable, and with proper use of the health pass. Then the big bet is on the vaccinations.”
-From The Associated Press, last updated at 7:30 a.m. ET
What’s happening across Canada
What’s happening around the world
People who just received a COVID-19 shot wait for their vaccine card to be processed at the Orange Farm, South Africa, multipurpose centre on Friday. South Africa has accelerated its vaccination campaign a week after the discovery of the omicron variant of the coronavirus. (Jerome Delay/The Associated Press)
As of early Monday morning, more than 265.9 million cases of COVID-19 had been reported worldwide, according to a case-tracking database maintained by U.S.-based Johns Hopkins University. The reported global death toll stood at more than 5.2 million.
In Africa, South Africa is preparing its hospitals for more admissions, as the omicron variant pushes the country into a fourth wave of COVID-19 infections, President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Monday. Ramaphosa said in a weekly newsletter that omicron appeared to be dominating new infections in most provinces and urged more people to get vaccinated against COVID-19.
“We will soon be convening a meeting of the National Coronavirus Command Council to review the state of the pandemic. This will enable us to take whatever further measures are needed to keep people safe and healthy,” he said.
Meanwhile, Senegal recorded its first case of the omicron variant in a tourist who attended a demonstration in Dakar last month with about 300 people of varying nationalities, a testing lab said on Sunday.
In the Americas, Argentina has detected its first case of the omicron coronavirus variant in a person who had travelled from South Africa, the South American country’s Health Ministry said late on Sunday. Argentina joined Brazil, Mexico and Chile on the list of Latin American countries where cases of the new variant have been detected.
Students wash their hands before classes at Ricardo P. Cruz elementary school in Taguig city, suburban Manila, on Monday after authorities loosened restrictions to allow limited in-person classes in the capital city. (Ted Aljibe/AFP/Getty Images)
In the Asia-Pacific region, some children in the Philippines’ capital Manila returned to school on Monday after a near two-year suspension.
Meanwhile, health officials in Thailand and Nepal reported finding first cases of the omicron variant. In both countries, the cases were detected in foreign nationals, health officials said.
In the Middle East, a Jordanian court sentenced five senior health officials to three years in jail for causing the death of 10 COVID-19 patients following an oxygen outage in a major state hospital, state media said.
In Europe, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said his government would present a new package of pandemic restrictions this week in response to the new variant and was considering how to handle the approaching Christmas holidays.
“The situation is indeed not looking good…. We have many deaths,” Morawiecki told a news conference.
-From The Associated Press, Reuters and CBC News, last updated at 9:35 a.m. ET
TORONTO – Unifor says workers at a Walmart warehouse in Mississauga, Ont., have voted to join the union.
The union says it’s Walmart’s first warehouse to unionize in Canada.
Unifor national president Lana Payne says the employees stood up for their rights and the union is excited to get to work on their first collective agreement.
Unifor’s campaign at Walmart’s facility began in December 2023.
The vote was held from Sept. 10 to 12.
Unifor represents 315,000 workers across the country.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
The Canadian government says it will donate up to 200,000 vaccine doses to fight the mpox outbreak in Congo and other African countries.
It says the donated doses of Imvamune will come from Canada’s existing supply and will not affect the country’s preparedness for mpox cases in this country.
Minister of Health Mark Holland says the donation “will help to protect those in the most affected regions of Africa and will help prevent further spread of the virus.”
Dr. Madhukar Pai, Canada research chair in epidemiology and global health, says although the donation is welcome, it is a very small portion of the estimated 10 million vaccine doses needed to control the outbreak.
Vaccine donations from wealthier countries have only recently started arriving in Africa, almost a month after the World Health Organization declared the mpox outbreak a public health emergency of international concern.
A few days after the declaration in August, Global Affairs Canada announced a contribution of $1 million for mpox surveillance, diagnostic tools, research and community awareness in Africa.
On Thursday, the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said mpox is still on the rise and that testing rates are “insufficient” across the continent.
Jason Kindrachuk, Canada research chair in emerging viruses at the University of Manitoba, said donating vaccines, in addition to supporting surveillance and diagnostic tests, is “massively important.”
But Kindrachuk, who has worked on the ground in Congo during the epidemic, also said that the international response to the mpox outbreak is “better late than never (but) better never late.”
“It would have been fantastic for us globally to not be in this position by having provided doses a much, much longer time prior than when we are,” he said, noting that the outbreak of clade I mpox in Congo started in early 2023.
Clade II mpox, endemic in regions of West Africa, came to the world’s attention even earlier — in 2022 — as that strain of virus spread to other countries, including Canada.
Two doses are recommended for mpox vaccination, so the donation may only benefit 100,000 people, Pai said.
Pai questioned whether Canada is contributing enough, as the federal government hasn’t said what percentage of its mpox vaccine stockpile it is donating.
“Small donations are simply not going to help end this crisis. We need to show greater solidarity and support,” he said in an email.
“That is the biggest lesson from the COVID-19 pandemic — our collective safety is tied with that of other nations.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
MONTREAL – A 20-year-old man arrested over an alleged Islamic State terror plot to kill Jews in New York City will return to court in December in Montreal.
Muhammad Shahzeb Khan, a Pakistani national living in Ontario, was arrested last week in Ormstown, Que., allegedly on his way across the border into New York state.
Khan has been charged in the United States with one count of attempting to provide material support and resources to a terrorist organization, and officials are seeking to have him extradited to stand trial.
He was not present for a hearing today in Quebec Superior Court, where lawyers said they are waiting for extradition documents and for authorization from Canadian officials before proceeding in the case, which will return before a judge on Dec. 6.
U.S. authorities allege that Khan, also known as Shahzeb Jadoon, intended to use “automatic and semi-automatic weapons” in a mass shooting at a Jewish centre in Brooklyn around Oct. 7, the one-year anniversary of the Hamas attack on Israel.
Authorities allege he began planning his attack in November 2023.
Earlier this week, federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller said Khan arrived in Canada in June 2023 on a student visa.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
