People in British Columbia and Alberta’s two largest cities are facing tighter restrictions around some social gatherings after an uptick in COVID-19 cases.
Alberta’s Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Deena Hinshaw said Monday that while she has often spoken about the need to “balance between minimizing the risk of COVID-19 and minimizing the risk of harms of restrictions,” the province is now “losing the balance we have been seeking.”
The temporary measure, which caps attendance at 15 for events where people will be “mixing and mingling” like parties and baby showers, applies in the Calgary and Edmonton areas.
Alberta has reported a total of 25,733 cases since the pandemic began, with 4,477 of those listed as active cases. As of Sunday, health officials reported 118 people were being treated in Alberta hospitals, with 16 of those patients in ICU beds.
Dr. Bonnie Henry, provincial health officer in British Columbia, also placed restrictions on gatherings on Monday, with a focus on events in people’s homes. Henry said gatherings are now limited to people in an immediate household, plus their so-called “safe six” guests.
WATCH | Dr. Bonnie Henry said mask-wearing is expected in public in B.C.:
B.C.’s provincial health officer says British Columbians must wear non-medical masks in public, but stopped short of making them mandatory. 2:13
“This is a bit of a sobering weekend for us,” she said after provincial health officials reported 817 new cases since Friday.
B.C. has reported a total of 13,371 COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began, with 2,325 of the cases considered active. The most recent information from health officials said 77 people were in hospital with 26 in intensive care.
What’s happening across Canada
As of 7 a.m. ET on Tuesday, Canada had 220,213 confirmed or presumptive coronavirus cases. Provinces and territories listed 184,303 of those as recovered or resolved. A CBC News tally of deaths based on provincial reports, regional health information and CBC’s reporting stood at 9,973.
Manitoba’s provincial public health officer also urged people to avoid gathering in large groups, saying many of the 100 new cases reported in the province on Monday linked back to social gatherings — including Thanksgiving.
Dr. Brent Roussin said if the province’s trajectory continues, health officials expect to have a total of more than 5,000 cases by the end of the week. The province had 4,349 cases as of Monday, with 2,117 considered active. There were 80 people in hospital, with 15 in intensive care.
WATCH | Manitoba frustrated by rise in COVID-19 cases:
As Manitoba sees a continued increase in COVID-19 cases, it’s seeing an unprecedented surge in its hospitals and ICUs. As pressure to close parts of the province mounts — officials are pointing fingers and doctors are bracing for the worst. 1:55
Roussin wasn’t the only Manitoba official with words of warning. Premier Brian Pallister expressed frustration on Monday at people with too many close contacts as cases increase.
“Grow up and stop going out there and giving people COVID,” the premier said.
Saskatchewan reported 54 new COVID-19 cases on Monday, bringing the total number of reported cases in the province to 2,783, with 650 of those considered active cases.
In Ontario, a region west of Toronto is waiting for word on whether tougher measures will be imposed by the province as part of the effort to fight COVID-19. Dr. David Williams, the province’s chief medical officer, said while neither he nor Halton Region’s local medical officer are ready to make a decision on tighter measures for the area, they will be watching case counts and other metrics closely in the coming days.
Quebec Premier François Legault moved Monday to extend restrictions on people living in so-called red zones until Nov. 23, saying daily COVID-19 case numbers and deaths are still too high to allow an easing of limits in places like Montreal and Quebec City.
WATCH | How health authorities are trying to balance restrictions and COVID-19 caseloads:
Infectious disease physician Dr. Zain Chagla discusses how health officials try to balance restrictions and COVID-19 case loads when the data doesn’t show up for weeks after a decision is made. 1:35
In Atlantic Canada, New Brunswick reported three new cases on Monday, bringing the total number of active cases in the province to 60. Health officials in both Nova Scotia and Newfoundlandreported one new case, while there were no new cases reported in Prince Edward Island.
There were two new cases reported in Yukon on Monday, and a mine in Nunavut reported that two workers who had been reported as presumptive cases were confirmed as positive for COVID-19. The workers were flown to their home province of Quebec and instructed to self-isolate.
What’s happening around the world
Several potential COVID-19 vaccines are seeing early results from Phase 3 trials, with AstraZeneca saying its has shown results in older and younger participants. Meanwhile, Moderna is so positive about its results it has applied to make its vaccine available earlier. 2:07
A case count maintained by Johns Hopkins University put the number of COVID-19 cases around the world at over 43.5 million as of Tuesday morning with over 29.2 million cases considered recovered. The Baltimore, Md.-based institution’s count of deaths stood at more than 1.1 million.
In the Americas, the number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients in the United States is at a two-month high, straining health-care systems in some states.
The White House said on Tuesday it saw a potential deal on COVID-19 stimulus funding in “coming weeks,” casting doubt on whether a deal could be struck with Congress before the Nov. 3 election. A spokesperson for Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Monday that she was hopeful an agreement could be reached ahead of the election, but noted that there were still major issues that needed to be addressed.
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, people vote in the U.S. presidential election in the Jurassic Parking structure at Universal Studios Hollywood in Universal City, Calif., on Monday. (Mario Anzuoni/Reuters)
In the Asia-Pacific region, China reported the highest number of asymptomatic infections in nearly seven months. China detected 137 new asymptomatic coronavirus cases on Sunday in Kashgar in the northwestern region of Xinjiang after one person was found to have the virus the previous day — the first local new cases in 10 days in mainland China.
Hong Kong announced it would reopen public beaches and increase the number of people allowed to sit together in bars and restaurants starting Friday as the city continues to unwind strict COVID-19 rules put in place in July.
In India, authorities reported 36,470 newly confirmed coronavirus infections. That’s the lowest one-day tally in more than three months in a continuing downward trend. In its report Tuesday, the country’s health ministry also listed 488 new fatalities from COVID-19 in the previous 24 hours, raising the overall death toll to 119,502.
The case number reported Tuesday is the lowest since India had 35,065 newly confirmed infections on July 17. Last month, the country hit a peak of nearly 100,000 cases in a single day, but daily infections have been decreasing since then.
In Europe, many governments prepared on Tuesday to introduce new restrictions to try to curb a growing surge of coronavirus infections across the continent and provide economic balm to help businesses survive the pandemic.
Italian police officers stand in front of a shattered Gucci store window during a protest of far-right activists against measures to curb the spread of COVID-19, in downtown Turin on Monday. (Marco Bertorello/AFP/Getty Images)
Hundreds of protesters took to the streets across Italy on Monday to vent their anger at the latest round of restrictions, including early closing for bars and restaurants, with demonstrations in some cities turning violent.
In neighbouring France, Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin warned the country to prepare for “difficult decisions” after some of the strictest restrictions currently in place anywhere in Europe have failed to halt the spread of the disease.
South Africa remained the hardest hit country in Africa, with more than 716,000 recorded COVID-19 cases and more than 19,000 deaths according to the Africa CDC.
People in Iran, the hardest-hit country in the Middle East, faced new daily records of infections and deaths. Authorities have ordered residents in Tehran to wear masks in public, and many public sector workers in the capital have been told to stay home every second day.
TORONTO – An Ontario judge says any outstanding issues regarding a proposed $32.5 billion settlement between three major tobacco companies and their creditors should be solvable in the coming months.
Ontario Superior Court Chief Justice Geoffrey Morawetz has released his reasons for approving a motion last week to have representatives for creditors review and vote on the proposal in December.
One of the companies, JTI-Macdonald Corp., said last week it objects to the plan in its current form and asked the court to postpone scheduling the vote until several issues were resolved.
The other two companies, Rothmans, Benson & Hedges and Imperial Tobacco Canada Ltd., didn’t oppose the motion but said they retained the right to contest the proposed plan down the line.
The proposal announced last month includes $24 billion for provinces and territories seeking to recover smoking-related health-care costs and about $6 billion for smokers across Canada and their loved ones.
If the proposed deal is accepted by a majority of creditors, it will then move on to the next step: a hearing to obtain the approval of the court, tentatively scheduled for early next year.
In a written decision released Monday, Morawetz said it was clear that not all issues had been resolved at this stage of the proceedings.
He pointed to “outstanding issues” between the companies regarding their respective shares of the total payout, as well as debate over the creditor status of one of JTI-Macdonald’s affiliate companies.
In order to have creditors vote on a proposal, the court must be satisfied the plan isn’t “doomed to fail” either at the creditors or court approval stages, court heard last week.
Lawyers representing plaintiffs in two Quebec class actions, those representing smokers in the rest of Canada, and 10 out of 13 provinces and territories have expressed their support for the proposal, the judge wrote in his ruling.
While JTI-Macdonald said its concerns have not been addressed, the company’s lawyer “acknowledged that the issues were solvable,” Morawetz wrote.
“At this stage, I am unable to conclude that the plans are doomed to fail,” he said.
“There are a number of outstanding issues as between the parties, but there are no issues that, in my view, cannot be solved,” he said.
The proposed settlement is the culmination of more than five years of negotiations in what Morawetz has called one of “the most complex insolvency proceedings in Canadian history.”
The companies sought creditor protection in Ontario in 2019 after Quebec’s top court upheld a landmark ruling ordering them to pay about $15 billion to plaintiffs in two class-action lawsuits.
All legal proceedings against the companies, including lawsuits filed by provincial governments, have been paused during the negotiations. That order has now been extended until the end of January 2025.
In total, the companies faced claims of more than $1 trillion, court documents show.
In October of last year, the court instructed the mediator in the case, former Chief Justice of Ontario Warren Winkler, and the monitors appointed to each company to develop a proposed plan for a global settlement, with input from the companies and creditors.
A year later, they proposed a plan that would involve upfront payments as well as annual ones based on the companies’ net after-tax income and any tax refunds, court documents show.
The monitors estimate it would take the companies about 20 years to pay the entire amount, the documents show.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
OTTAWA – The Federal Court of Appeal has dismissed a bid by the Prince Edward Island Potato Board to overturn a 2021 decision by the federal agriculture minister to declare the entire province as “a place infested with potato wart.”
That order prohibited the export of seed potatoes from the Island to prevent the spread of the soil-borne fungus, which deforms potatoes and makes them impossible to sell.
The board had argued in Federal Court that the decision was unreasonable because there was insufficient evidence to establish that P.E.I. was infested with the fungus.
In April 2023, the Federal Court dismissed the board’s application for a judicial review, saying the order was reasonable because the Canadian Food Inspection Agency said regulatory measures had failed to prevent the transmission of potato wart to unregulated fields.
On Tuesday, the Appeal Court dismissed the board’s appeal, saying the lower court had selected the correct reasonableness standard to review the minister’s order.
As well, it found the lower court was correct in accepting the minister’s view that the province was “infested” because the department had detected potato wart on 35 occasions in P.E.I.’s three counties since 2000.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
FREDERICTON – New Brunswick health officials are urging parents to get their children vaccinated against measles after the number of cases of the disease in a recent outbreak has more than doubled since Friday.
Sean Hatchard, spokesman for the Health Department, says measles cases in the Fredericton and the upper Saint John River Valley area have risen from five on Friday to 12 as of Tuesday morning.
Hatchard says other suspected cases are under investigation, but he did not say how and where the outbreak of the disease began.
He says data from the 2023-24 school year show that about 10 per cent of students were not completely immunized against the disease.
In response to the outbreak, Horizon Health Network is hosting measles vaccine clinics on Wednesday and Friday.
The measles virus is transmitted through the air or by direct contact with nasal or throat secretions of an infected person, and can be more severe in adults and infants.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2024.
