COVID-19 update for March 31: London Drugs booked up for vaccines | Tam says 'crisis phase' will be over by fall | Age 55 to 65 in Vancouver Coastal Health and Fraser Health can book vaccine | 840 new cases | State of emergency extended - Vancouver Sun | Canada News Media
COVID-19 update for March 31: London Drugs booked up for vaccines | Tam says 'crisis phase' will be over by fall | Age 55 to 65 in Vancouver Coastal Health and Fraser Health can book vaccine | 840 new cases | State of emergency extended – Vancouver Sun
Here’s your daily update with everything you need to know on the novel coronavirus situation in B.C.
Author of the article:
Scott Brown, Tiffany Crawford, Cheryl Chan, David Carrigg
The ultrastructural morphology exhibited by the 2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), first detected in Wuhan, China, is seen in an illustration released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. January 29, 2020. Photo by Handout . /via REUTERS
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Here’s your daily update with everything you need to know on the novel coronavirus situation in B.C. for March 31, 2021.
We’ll provide summaries of what’s going on in B.C. right here so you can get the latest news at a glance. This page will be updated regularly throughout the day, with developments added as they happen.
Check back here for more updates throughout the day. You can also get the latest COVID-19 news delivered to your inbox weeknights at 7 p.m. by subscribing to our newsletter here.
B.C.’S COVID-19 CASE NUMBERS
As of the latest figures given on March 29:
• Total number of confirmed cases: 99,035 (7,062 active) • New cases since March 29: 840 • Total deaths: 1,455 (0 new) • Hospitalized cases: 312 • Intensive care: 78 • Total vaccinations: 724,193 people have received one of the three approved vaccines, including 87,319 who have received a second dose. • Cases under public health monitoring: 11,164 • Recovered: 90,401 • Long-term care and assisted-living homes, and acute care facilities currently affected: 12
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Students in Grade 4 and up will be required to wear masks in classrooms, according to updated guidelines released Tuesday night by the B.C. Ministry of Education. Whether masks in schools are mandatory or simply recommended was a source of confusion following the tougher restrictions announced Monday by provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry.
There’s also confusion among other businesses, such as brewpubs with patios and bowling alleys, which complain that vague public health guidelines leave them wondering whether they have to close.
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According to safety guidelines sent to schools Tuesday, “effective immediately all K-12 staff and all students in grades 4 to 12 will be required to wear non-medical masks in all indoor areas, including when they are at their work stations (desks), and on school buses — both within and outside of their learning group.” Masks for students in kindergarten to Grade 3 are encouraged but not mandatory.
There are exceptions for people who have health or disability challenges that prevent them from wearing a mask, and in cases where a service is being provided to someone, such as a person with hearing impairment who relies on lip reading or facial expressions to communicate. Students can remove masks temporarily to engage in an activity where the mask is prohibitive, such as eating or drinking, playing an instrument or engaging in physical activity.
“Schools reflect what’s happening in local communities, and we support public health’s decision to introduce additional mask measures to our K-12 guidelines across the province,” Education Minister Jennifer Whiteside said in a statement Wednesday morning. “Since the beginning of the pandemic, public health orders and guidelines have been amended to reflect changing knowledge and the risk of spread of COVID-19 in the community and different settings.”
Since Monday, the B.C. Teachers’ Federation has been fielding questions from confused teachers and parents who said they were unclear as to whether Henry’s announcement Monday meant masks were mandatory or recommended. On Tuesday night, the union posted the relevant section from the Education Ministry’s updated health and safety guidelines to clarify that masks are required for students in grades 4 to 12, a measure the BCTF has been calling for for months.
Ryan Reynolds couldn’t help himself when he got his shot of the COVID-19 vaccine.
Known for his wisecracks both on-screen (Deadpool) and off, the Vancouver actor cracked, “Finally got 5G,” in an Instagram post that showed him sporting a pink tuque and rolling up the short sleeve of his white T-shirt to get the jab.
The joke was seemingly aimed at anti-vaxxers or conspiracy theorists. Some people have claimed the COVID-19 pandemic is part of a plan to implant microchips into humans that can be activated by 5G networks (the fifth-generation technology standard for broadband cellular networks).
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– Postmedia
11:30 a.m. – Tam says ‘crisis phase’ will be over by fall
Canada’s top public health doctor says she expects the “crisis phase of the pandemic” will be over before the fall.
Dr. Theresa Tam says the next few weeks may be the most challenging yet, as the third resurgence of cases driven by unrelenting variants of concern means there is even less “room for errors” in our public health measures.
But she says with every week that passes, with every shipment of vaccines and with the onset of nicer weather that will allow us to do more outdoor activities safely, things are going to get easier.
By June, Tam says, every adult Canadian who wants a vaccine will get at least one dose.
And by the fall, she says, they will get their second.
– The Canadian Press
10:30 a.m. – Facebook Live with Dr. Theresa Tam – Your COVID-19 Vaccine Questions Answered
Facebook Canada is hosting Your COVID-19 Vaccine Questions Answered, a Facebook Live event with Canada’s top doctors to connect millions of Canadians with trusted COVID-19 vaccine information.
Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Howard Njoo, Canada’s Deputy Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Evan Adams, Deputy Chief Medical Officer at Indigenous Services Canada Dr. Supriya Sharma, Chief Medical Advisor, Health Canada Samantha Yammine, PhD, neuroscientist, molecular biologist and popular science communicator known as Science Sam Danielle Nadin, CIHR Institute of Gender and Health
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Starting today people aged 55 to 65 living in the Lower Mainland can book a AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD vaccine, but there may be a wait, as already one major pharmacy says it is all booked up.
On Tuesday night, a day before the bookings opened for this category, London Drugs announced on Twitter that due to an “overwhelming response,” all vaccine appointments have been booked at the three London Drugs pharmacies selected by the B.C. government to offer the vaccine.
The company asked people not to call the pharmacies so they can prepare for the “fully booked” appointments.
The B.C. Pharmacy Association website has a list of pharmacies offering the vaccine, which will be updated regularly in the coming weeks.
Those going to get a vaccine will be required to bring their Personal Health Number, located on your CareCard or driver’s license.
The AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD vaccine is currently not available in pharmacies in the Northern, Interior, and Vancouver Island health authorities at this time.
Premier John Horgan shamed and blamed young people for spreading COVID-19, but his “do not blow this” finger-wagging appeal has faced swift backlash from those he was trying to bring on side.
He resisted calls to apologize on Tuesday, but said he acknowledges the sacrifices of young people and was trying to catch the attention of the few who are breaking the rules.
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His initial comments, critics say, were counter-intuitive and harmful to young people who are disproportionately working in higher-risk, front-line jobs hard hit by Monday’s tougher restrictions on restaurants and the closure of Whistler-Blackcomb ski resort.
On Monday, Horgan said people between 20 and 39 are “quite frankly, putting the rest of us in a challenging situation.”
“My appeal to you is, do not blow this for the rest of us,” he said. “Do not blow this for your parents and your neighbours and others who have been working really, really hard, making significant sacrifices so we can get good outcomes for everybody.”
Justin Kulik, the NDP’s youngest candidate in the last election, called on Horgan to apologize for his “hurtful” remarks.
Horgan did not apologize, instead writing on Twitter Tuesday that his top concern is protecting people from the virus and getting through the “last mile” safely.
“I’m trying to catch the attention of the few who refuse to follow the public health restrictions. To the vast majority of young people doing everything they can: thank you,” he wrote.
He acknowledged that young people, who often work in front-line jobs or living with roommates. have made “tremendous sacrifices” to fight COVID-19.
On Monday, B.C. announced it was suspending the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine in people 55 and younger due to concerns over a “very rare” blood clot condition.
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For a primer that breaks down why B.C. is halting the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine in younger people, but at the same time accelerating the vaccination of other age groups using this vaccine read Cheryl Chan’s breakdown here.
2 a.m. – As of today, Lower Mainland residents age 55 to 65 can book a vaccine
B.C. is now offering a COVID-19 vaccine to Lower Mainland residents age 55 to 65, according to Vancouver Coastal Health.
Starting today, eligible residents can call their local pharmacy to make an appointment to get their AstraZeneca/COVISHIELD vaccine.
About 150 pharmacies are participating in this partnership with Immunize B.C.
Drop-in service may also be an option.
The B.C. Pharmacy Association website has a list of pharmacies offering the vaccine, which will be updated regularly in the coming weeks.
12 a.m. – 840 new cases, no additional COVID-19 related deaths
B.C. reported 840 new cases, including 18 epidemiologically-linked cases, on Tuesday. There were no new deaths.
There are 7,062 active cases of COVID-19 in the province, including 312 people in hospital, 78 of whom are in intensive care.
There have been 320 new confirmed cases involving variants of concern.
12 a.m. – State of emergency extended to continue B.C.’s COVID-19 response
B.C. has extended the provincial state of emergency, allowing health and emergency management officials to continue to use measures under the Emergency Program Act to support the province’s COVID-19 pandemic response.
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The state of emergency is extended through the end of the day on April 13.
“While the finish line remains in sight, rising case counts and the spread of variants of concern mean we all must continue working together to keep each other safe,” said Premier John Horgan, in a statement.
The original declaration was made on March 18, 2020, the day after Dr. Bonnie Henry, B.C.’s provincial health officer, declared a public health emergency.
B.C. VACCINE TRACKER
LOCAL RESOURCES for COVID-19 information
Here are a number of information and landing pages for COVID-19 from various health and government agencies.
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“Communication is one of the most important skills you require for a successful life.” — Catherine Pulsifer, author.
I’m one hundred percent in agreement with Pulsifer, which is why my evaluation of candidates begins with their writing skills. If a candidate’s writing skills and verbal communication skills, which I’ll assess when interviewing, aren’t well above average, I’ll pass on them regardless of their skills and experience.
Why?
Because business is fundamentally about getting other people to do things—getting employees to be productive, getting customers to buy your products or services, and getting vendors to agree to a counteroffer price. In business, as in life in general, you can’t make anything happen without effective communication; this is especially true when job searching when your writing is often an employer’s first impression of you.
Think of all the writing you engage in during a job search (resumes, cover letters, emails, texts) and all your other writing (LinkedIn profile, as well as posts and comments, blogs, articles, tweets, etc.) employers will read when they Google you to determine if you’re interview-worthy.
With so much of our communication today taking place via writing (email, text, collaboration platforms such as Microsoft Teams, Slack, ClickUp, WhatsApp and Rocket.Chat), the importance of proficient writing skills can’t be overstated.
When assessing a candidate’s writing skills, you probably think I’m looking for grammar and spelling errors. Although error-free writing is important—it shows professionalism and attention to detail—it’s not the primary reason I look at a candidate’s writing skills.
The way someone writes reveals how they think.
Clear writing = Clear thinking
Structured paragraphs = Structured mind
Impactful sentences = Impactful ideas
Effective writing isn’t about using sophisticated vocabulary. Hemingway demonstrated that deceptively simple, stripped-down prose can captivate readers. Effective writing takes intricate thoughts and presents them in a way that makes the reader think, “Damn! Why didn’t I see it that way?” A good writer is a dead giveaway for a good thinker. More than ever, the business world needs “good thinkers.”
Therefore, when I come across a candidate who’s a good writer, hence a good thinker, I know they’re likely to be able to write:
Emails that don’t get deleted immediately and are responded to
Simple, concise, and unambiguous instructions
Pitches that are likely to get read
Social media content that stops thumbs
Human-sounding website copy
Persuasively, while attuned to the reader’s possible sensitivities
Now, let’s talk about the elephant in the room: AI, which job seekers are using en masse. Earlier this year, I wrote that AI’s ability to hyper-increase an employee’s productivity—AI is still in its infancy; we’ve seen nothing yet—in certain professions, such as writing, sales and marketing, computer programming, office and admin, and customer service, makes it a “fewer employees needed” tool, which understandably greatly appeals to employers. In my opinion, the recent layoffs aren’t related to the economy; they’re due to employers adopting AI. Additionally, companies are trying to balance investing in AI with cost-cutting measures. CEOs who’ve previously said, “Our people are everything,” have arguably created today’s job market by obsessively focusing on AI to gain competitive advantages and reduce their largest expense, their payroll.
It wouldn’t be a stretch to assume that most AI usage involves generating written content, content that’s obvious to me, and likely to you as well, to have been written by AI. However, here’s the twist: I don’t particularly care.
Why?
Because the fundamental skill I’m looking for is the ability to organize thoughts and communicate effectively. What I care about is whether the candidate can take AI-generated content and transform it into something uniquely valuable. If they can, they’re demonstrating the skills of being a good thinker and communicator. It’s like being a great DJ; anyone can push play, but it takes skill to read a room and mix music that gets people pumped.
Using AI requires prompting effectively, which requires good writing skills to write clear and precise instructions that guide the AI to produce desired outcomes. Prompting AI effectively requires understanding structure, flow and impact. You need to know how to shape raw information, such as milestones throughout your career when you achieved quantitative results, into a compelling narrative.
So, what’s the best way to gain and enhance your writing skills? As with any skill, you’ve got to work at it.
Two rules guide my writing:
Use strong verbs and nouns instead of relying on adverbs, such as “She dashed to the store.” instead of “She ran quickly to the store.” or “He whispered to the child.” instead of “He spoke softly to the child.”
Avoid using long words when a shorter one will do, such as “use” instead of “utilize” or “ask” instead of “inquire.” As attention spans get shorter, I aim for clarity, simplicity and, most importantly, brevity in my writing.
Don’t just string words together; learn to organize your thoughts, think critically, and communicate clearly. Solid writing skills will significantly set you apart from your competition, giving you an advantage in your job search and career.
Nick Kossovan, a well-seasoned veteran of the corporate landscape, offers “unsweetened” job search advice. You can send Nick your questions to artoffindingwork@gmail.com.
MONTREAL – Politics, public opinion and salary hikes south of the border helped push Air Canada toward a deal that secures major pay gains for pilots, experts say.
Hammered out over the weekend, the would-be agreement includes a cumulative wage hike of nearly 42 per cent over four years — an enormous bump by historical standards — according to one source who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. The previous 10-year contract granted increases of just two per cent annually.
The federal government’s stated unwillingness to step in paved the way for a deal, noted John Gradek, after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made it plain the two sides should hash one out themselves.
“Public opinion basically pressed the federal cabinet, including the prime minister, to keep their hands clear of negotiations and looking at imposing a settlement,” said Gradek, who teaches aviation management at McGill University.
After late-night talks at a hotel near Toronto’s Pearson airport, the country’s biggest airline and the union representing 5,200-plus aviators announced early Sunday morning they had reached a tentative agreement, averting a strike that would have grounded flights and affected some 110,000 passengers daily.
The relative precariousness of the Liberal minority government as well as a push to appear more pro-labour underlay the prime minister’s hands-off approach to the negotiations.
Trudeau said Friday the government would not step in to fix the impasse — unlike during a massive railway work stoppage last month and a strike by WestJet mechanics over the Canada Day long weekend that workers claimed road roughshod over their constitutional right to collective bargaining. Trudeau said the government respects the right to strike and would only intervene if it became apparent no negotiated deal was possible.
“They felt that they really didn’t want to try for a third attempt at intervention and basically said, ‘Let’s let the airline decide how they want to deal with this one,'” said Gradek.
“Air Canada ran out of support as the week wore on, and by the time they got to Friday night, Saturday morning, there was nothing left for them to do but to basically try to get a deal set up and accepted by ALPA (Air Line Pilots Association).”
Trudeau’s government was also unlikely to consider back-to-work legislation after the NDP tore up its agreement to support the Liberal minority in Parliament, Gradek said. Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, whose party has traditionally toed a more pro-business line, also said last week that Tories “stand with the pilots” and swore off “pre-empting” the negotiations.
Air Canada CEO Michael Rousseau had asked Ottawa on Thursday to impose binding arbitration pre-emptively — “before any travel disruption starts” — if talks failed. Backed by business leaders, he’d hoped for an effective repeat of the Conservatives’ move to head off a strike in 2012 by legislating Air Canada pilots and ground crew to stick to their posts before any work stoppage could start.
The request may have fallen flat, however. Gradek said he believes there was less anxiety over the fallout from an airline strike than from the countrywide railway shutdown.
He also speculated that public frustration over thousands of cancelled flights would have flowed toward Air Canada rather than Ottawa, prompting the carrier to concede to a deal yielding “unheard of” gains for employees.
“It really was a total collapse of the Air Canada bargaining position,” he said.
Pilots are slated to vote in the coming weeks on the four-year contract.
Last year, pilots at Delta Air Lines, United Airlines and American Airlines secured agreements that included four-year pay boosts ranging from 34 per cent to 40 per cent, ramping up pressure on other carriers to raise wages.
After more than a year of bargaining, Air Canada put forward an offer in August centred around a 30 per cent wage hike over four years.
But the final deal, should union members approve it, grants a 26 per cent increase in the first year alone, retroactive to September 2023, according to the source. Three wage bumps of four per cent would follow in 2024 through 2026.
Passengers may wind up shouldering some of that financial load, one expert noted.
“At the end of the day, it’s all us consumers who are paying,” said Barry Prentice, who heads the University of Manitoba’s transport institute.
Higher fares may be mitigated by the persistence of budget carrier Flair Airlines and the rapid expansion of Porter Airlines — a growing Air Canada rival — as well as waning demand for leisure trips. Corporate travel also remains below pre-COVID-19 levels.
Air Canada said Sunday the tentative contract “recognizes the contributions and professionalism of Air Canada’s pilot group, while providing a framework for the future growth of the airline.”
The union issued a statement saying that, if ratified, the agreement will generate about $1.9 billion of additional value for Air Canada pilots over the course of the deal.
Meanwhile, labour tension with cabin crew looms on the horizon. Air Canada is poised to kick off negotiations with the union representing more than 10,000 flight attendants this year before the contract expires on March 31.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
HALIFAX – Ottawa is negotiating a $500-million bailout for Nova Scotia’s privately owned electric utility, saying the money will be used to prevent a big spike in electricity rates.
Federal Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson made the announcement today in Halifax, saying Nova Scotia Power Inc. needs the money to cover higher costs resulting from the delayed delivery of electricity from the Muskrat Falls hydroelectric plant in Labrador.
Wilkinson says that without the money, the subsidiary of Emera Inc. would have had to increase rates by 19 per cent over “the short term.”
Nova Scotia Power CEO Peter Gregg says the deal, once approved by the province’s energy regulator, will keep rate increases limited “to be around the rate of inflation,” as costs are spread over a number of years.
The utility helped pay for construction of an underwater transmission link between Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, but the Muskrat Falls project has not been consistent in delivering electricity over the past five years.
Those delays forced Nova Scotia Power to spend more on generating its own electricity.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
