Health

COVID-19 update for Oct. 5: Here's the latest on coronavirus in BC – Vancouver Sun

Published

3 years ago

October 5, 2021

Harry Miller

Here’s your daily update with everything you need to know on the novel coronavirus situation in B.C.

Author of the article:

Cheryl Chan

Publishing date:

Oct 05, 2021 • 25 minutes ago • 7 minute read • 14 Comments

Here’s your daily update with everything you need to know on the novel coronavirus situation in B.C. Photo by StarLineArts /Getty Images

Here’s your daily update with everything you need to know on the novel coronavirus situation in B.C. for Oct. 5, 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 Oct. 5:

• Total number of confirmed cases: 190,372 (5,937 active)
• New cases since Oct. 4: 593
• Total deaths: 1,993 (no additional deaths)
• Hospitalized cases: 345 (up 19)
• Intensive care: 144 (up two)
• Total vaccinations: 4,092,813 received first dose; 3,789,179 second doses
• Recovered from acute infection: 182,045
• Long-term care and assisted-living homes, and acute care facilities currently affected: 19

IN-DEPTH:Here are all the B.C. cases of the novel coronavirus in 2021 | in 2020

B.C. GUIDES AND LINKS

• COVID-19: Here’s everything you need to know about the novel coronavirus

• COVID-19: B.C.’s vaccine passport is here and this is how it works

• COVID-19: Here’s how to get your vaccination shot in B.C.

• COVID-19: Look up your neighbourhood in our interactive map of case and vaccination rates in B.C.

• COVID-19: Afraid of needles? Here’s how to overcome your fear and get vaccinated

• COVID-19: Five things to know about the P1 variant spreading in B.C.

• COVID-19: Here’s where to get tested in Metro Vancouver

• B.C. COVID-19 Symptom Self-Assessment Tool

LATEST NEWS on COVID-19 in B.C.

B.C. Ministry of Education to consider allowing school boards to mandate vaccination among staff

The New Westminster school district is seeking a legal opinion on whether it can mandate vaccination for all teachers and other workers at its 13 schools.

The move comes as B.C. Health Minister Adrian Dix revealed on Tuesday that an education advisory committee on standards and guidelines for school boards would discuss whether boards can implement vaccine mandates.

“We know there is a desire expressed by people in the school communities for (vaccination) mandates in education,” Dix said.

“As such, my colleague Minister of Education Jennifer Whiteside is immediately convening an advisory committee, an ad hoc one with (B.C. Public School Employers’ Association) and other partners, to develop common principles, standards and guidelines to support boards with the potential implementation of vaccine mandates.

“The committee will work quickly to get these materials to boards as soon as possible. If boards wish to explore a vaccine policy independently, we would strongly encourage them to work with BCPSEA and their local partners.”

Last Friday, New Westminster Schools approved a motion to seek a legal opinion “on mandatory staff vaccinations” with the report due by Oct. 12.

In a prepared statement, school board vice chair Dee Beattie said the motion was passed to get a better understanding of legal options around vaccinations.

BCTF president Teri Mooring told Postmedia News that Tuesday’s statement by Dix was the first time she had heard about the Ministry of Education looking at creating guidelines for school districts should they decide to implement vaccination mandates.

B.C. to require mandatory vaccination for 30,000 government workers

Mandatory vaccinations are coming for B.C.’s 30,000 public service employees.

On Tuesday, the provincial government said it will make COVID-19 vaccinations a requirement for B.C. public service employees.

The B.C. Public Service Agency said it will require employees to be fully vaccinated by Nov. 22.

People who are unable to be vaccinated will be accommodated, said the government in its release, with more details to be released in early November.

— Cheryl Chan

Health officials to give COVID-19 news briefing today

B.C. health officials are scheduled to give a COVID-19 update Tuesday at 1:30 p.m.

Health Minister Adrian Dix and provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry are expected to be in attendance.

On Monday, the province began its booster-shot program for seniors living in long-term care and assisted living facilities. B.C.’s extended mask requirements to cover students from kindergarten to Grade 3 also started yesterday.

On Oct. 4, the province reported 1,986 new cases of COVID-19 over the last three days. There were 10 additional deaths.

After anti-vaccine protests, ‘bubble zones’ coming for B.C. hospitals and schools

VICTORIA — B.C. will introduce bubble-zone legislation during the fall legislature session to protect hospitals and schools from aggressive protesters who oppose vaccine cards and mandates.

B.C. Solicitor General and Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth, who has called aggressive and violent anti-vaccine protesters “COVIDiots,” confirmed the news Monday.

“I can confirm that it will be legislation and it will be introduced later this session.”

Protests at hospitals organized by people who don’t believe in the vaccine have turned ugly, with some health-care workers saying they’ve been physically and verbally assaulted coming to and leaving work.

— Victoria Times Colonist

An anti-vaxxer Edmonton Oiler got COVID and now his hockey career might be over

Josh Archibald is a forward with the Edmonton Oilers NHL hockey team. He refused to get vaccinated and had gone public on social media with COVID-denial theories. Now, following a diagnosis of a heart condition said to be an after-effect of someone who has contracted COVID, his playing days might be over.

According to protocols for unvaccinated players, Archibald was in a 14-day quarantine after travelling from the U.S, when he started feeling unwell. Archibald, 28, went for a battery of medical tests and doctors discovered he had COVID antibodies and myocarditis. It is suspected that Archibald had come down with COVID during the summer and myocarditis is a known after-effect of the virus.

Myocarditis can lead to cardiac arrest and possible death with the heart rate increasing through exertion.

During the pandemic, Archibald made his views about COVID known on social media, tweeting out COVID-denial information.

The diagnosis of myocarditis puts his career in serious jeopardy.

More COVID ICU patients coming to Island, Lower Mainland hospitals

VICTORIA — Seven more COVID patients are en route to hospitals on the Island and Lower Mainland from the northern health region, Health Minister Adrian Dix said Monday, as the province posted almost 2,000 new cases over the weekend.

Last week, the ministry said 25 ICU patients had been transferred from Northern Health to Island Health, Fraser Health and Vancouver Coastal Health since Sept. 6. Now the number is 32, which includes 26 COVID patients, he said.

“None of them — none, zero — are fully vaccinated,” Dix told media Monday.

The ministry was unable to say Monday how many have been transferred to Island Health hospitals.

Unvaccinated COVID cases are presenting profound challenges for the health-care system, Dix said.

Eighty-one per cent of those eligible for COVID vaccines in the province are fully immunized. A lower-dose vaccine is expected to be approved for kids age five to 11 by the end of the year.

The fall of Jacinda Ardern: Delta, low vaccination rates unravel New Zealand’s COVID lockdown strategy

In May last year, Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand’s youngest prime minister, also became its most popular since records began.

The phenomenon of “Jacinda-mania” swept through the island nation as she won worldwide praise for the decisive action that had restricted the country’s COVID-related deaths to just 26.

But the war against coronavirus is far from over, and there are growing signs that the 41-year-old Labour Party leader’s strategy of closing her country’s borders is unravelling.

The wildly infectious Delta variant has found its way into Auckland, and is spreading faster than the government can track it, despite a fresh lockdown. Fifty new cases were reported over the weekend and another 29 on Monday, bringing the current total number to 287 — including a newborn baby. The lockdown restrictions were expanded to the area south of New Zealand’s largest city after the emergence of unlinked cases in the Waikato region.

Ardern’s failure to vaccinate the Kiwi population, of whom 80 per cent remain unprotected, has made the country the perfect host for Delta, with no immunity through exposure to COVID. She threw a belt around her country, but did not bother with the braces.

Only now is she abandoning her “elimination” strategy in favour of a three-stage roadmap that takes into account vaccination rates.

B.C. MAP OF WEEKLY COVID CASE COUNTS, VACCINATION RATES

Find out how your neighbourhood is doing in the battle against COVID-19 with the latest number of new cases, positivity rates, and vaccination rates:

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.

• B.C. COVID-19 Symptom Self-Assessment Tool

• Vancouver Coastal Health – Information on Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19)

• HealthLink B.C. – Coronavirus (COVID-19) information page

• B.C. Centre for Disease Control – Novel coronavirus (COVID-19)

• Government of Canada – Coronavirus disease (COVID-19): Outbreak update

• World Health Organization – Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak

–with files from The Canadian Press

Adblock test (Why?)

Source link

Health

How many Nova Scotians are on the doctor wait-list? Number hit 160,000 in June

Published

1 day ago

September 11, 2024

Anne Joseph

HALIFAX – The Nova Scotia government says it could be months before it reveals how many people are on the wait-list for a family doctor.

The head of the province’s health authority told reporters Wednesday that the government won’t release updated data until the 160,000 people who were on the wait-list in June are contacted to verify whether they still need primary care.

Karen Oldfield said Nova Scotia Health is working on validating the primary care wait-list data before posting new numbers, and that work may take a matter of months. The most recent public wait-list figures are from June 1, when 160,234 people, or about 16 per cent of the population, were on it.

“It’s going to take time to make 160,000 calls,” Oldfield said. “We are not talking weeks, we are talking months.”

The interim CEO and president of Nova Scotia Health said people on the list are being asked where they live, whether they still need a family doctor, and to give an update on their health.

A spokesperson with the province’s Health Department says the government and its health authority are “working hard” to turn the wait-list registry into a useful tool, adding that the data will be shared once it is validated.

Nova Scotia’s NDP are calling on Premier Tim Houston to immediately release statistics on how many people are looking for a family doctor. On Tuesday, the NDP introduced a bill that would require the health minister to make the number public every month.

“It is unacceptable for the list to be more than three months out of date,” NDP Leader Claudia Chender said Tuesday.

Chender said releasing this data regularly is vital so Nova Scotians can track the government’s progress on its main 2021 campaign promise: fixing health care.

The number of people in need of a family doctor has more than doubled between the 2021 summer election campaign and June 2024. Since September 2021 about 300 doctors have been added to the provincial health system, the Health Department said.

“We’ll know if Tim Houston is keeping his 2021 election promise to fix health care when Nova Scotians are attached to primary care,” Chender said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.

Source link

Health

Newfoundland and Labrador monitoring rise in whooping cough cases: medical officer

Published

2 days ago

September 10, 2024

Anne Joseph

ST. JOHN’S, N.L. – Newfoundland and Labrador‘s chief medical officer is monitoring the rise of whooping cough infections across the province as cases of the highly contagious disease continue to grow across Canada.

Dr. Janice Fitzgerald says that so far this year, the province has recorded 230 confirmed cases of the vaccine-preventable respiratory tract infection, also known as pertussis.

Late last month, Quebec reported more than 11,000 cases during the same time period, while Ontario counted 470 cases, well above the five-year average of 98. In Quebec, the majority of patients are between the ages of 10 and 14.

Meanwhile, New Brunswick has declared a whooping cough outbreak across the province. A total of 141 cases were reported by last month, exceeding the five-year average of 34.

The disease can lead to severe complications among vulnerable populations including infants, who are at the highest risk of suffering from complications like pneumonia and seizures. Symptoms may start with a runny nose, mild fever and cough, then progress to severe coughing accompanied by a distinctive “whooping” sound during inhalation.

“The public, especially pregnant people and those in close contact with infants, are encouraged to be aware of symptoms related to pertussis and to ensure vaccinations are up to date,” Newfoundland and Labrador’s Health Department said in a statement.

Whooping cough can be treated with antibiotics, but vaccination is the most effective way to control the spread of the disease. As a result, the province has expanded immunization efforts this school year. While booster doses are already offered in Grade 9, the vaccine is now being offered to Grade 8 students as well.

Public health officials say whooping cough is a cyclical disease that increases every two to five or six years.

Meanwhile, New Brunswick’s acting chief medical officer of health expects the current case count to get worse before tapering off.

A rise in whooping cough cases has also been reported in the United States and elsewhere. The Pan American Health Organization issued an alert in July encouraging countries to ramp up their surveillance and vaccination coverage.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 10, 2024.

Source link

Health

Bizarre Sunlight Loophole Melts Belly Fat Fast!

Published

3 days ago

September 10, 2024

Sven Eggers

Product Name: Bizarre Sunlight Loophole Melts Belly Fat Fast!

Click here to get Bizarre Sunlight Loophole Melts Belly Fat Fast! at discounted price while it’s still available…

All orders are protected by SSL encryption – the highest industry standard for online security from trusted vendors.

Bizarre Sunlight Loophole Melts Belly Fat Fast! is backed with a 60 Day No Questions Asked Money Back Guarantee. If within the first 60 days of receipt you are not satisfied with Wake Up Lean™, you can request a refund by sending an email to the address given inside the product and we will immediately refund your entire purchase price, with no questions asked.

(more…)