The number of COVID-19 tests completed in Ontario each day has dwindled steadily over the past week, raising concerns that the province is missing cases of the illness and failing to capture the true spread of the novel coronavirus.
Data from the Ministry of Health shows there were just 2,568 new test results provided on Tuesday. That’s roughly half the daily target of 5,000 that the government promised to achieve in late March, and far short of the 19,000 tests per day promised for the third week of April.
The slower-than-promised pace continued Wednesday, with Ontario announcing 3,237 new test results.
To best combat the spread of COVID-19, experts in public health and epidemiology say Ontario needs to be testing more rather than less.
“I am a little bit concerned that we don’t have a very good handle of what’s happening with this epidemic right now,” Dr. Jeff Kwong, a professor of public health and family medicine at the University of Toronto, told CBC News.
“If we can identify more of the cases that are in the community it will help give us a better idea of what’s going on.”
Ontario is testing a smaller portion of its population than anywhere else in Canada. Quebec, B.C. and Alberta are each testing at double the province’s rate.
The reason for the shortfall appears to be that Ontario continues to restrict who gets tested by recommending against testing people who have not recently travelled internationally, even if they have symptoms of COVID-19.
“It’s possible that there are more people out there who have this infection that we’re not aware of, and they may be spreading it on to their contacts,” said Kwong.
Ontario is giving priority for testing to hospital patients, nursing-home residents and health-care workers. Despite that, Public Health Ontario laboratories struggled to keep up with the volume of tests in March, leading to a backlog that peaked at nearly 11,000 people waiting for their results.
That backlog is now cleared with help from private labs, and officials — including the health minister and the province’s associate medical officer of health — have said the public and private labs together can now process as many as 13,000 tests per day.
Dr. Vanessa Allen is chief of medical microbiology at Public Health Ontario. She says new guidelines for testing are coming. (Craig Chivers/CBC)
But Ontario has not tested anywhere near that many people in a single day yet, and there are no signs of when it will ramp up testing to use the full lab capacity.
One sign of how narrowly Ontario’s testing is focused on the most likely cases: nearly 15 per cent of the test results announced on Tuesday were positive. Quebec’s confirmed cases are running at about nine per cent of all tests, and in B.C. it’s less than three per cent.
Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott said she will soon announce plans for more testing of the most vulnerable populations, including residents of nursing and retirement homes.
“We have developed a strategy in order to be able to increase that testing there,” she told a news conference Tuesday.
Provincial officials have been working on new guidelines for testing that will make the most difference on health-care outcomes, said Dr. Vanessa Allen, chief of medical microbiology for Public Health Ontario.
“We want to be able to make the largest impact with the resources we have,” Allen said in an interview with CBC News.
“We have a responsibility to ramp up capacity so that we can get better tools for our response and a better picture of the epidemic.”
MONTREAL – One expert says entry-level pay under the tentative deal between Air Canada and its pilots could be a stumbling block ahead of a union vote on the agreement.
Under their current contract, pilots earn far less in their first four years at the company before enjoying a big wage increase starting in year five.
The Air Line Pilots Association had been pushing to scrap the so-called “fixed rate” provision entirely.
But according to a copy of the contract summary obtained by The Canadian Press, the proposed deal announced Sunday would merely cut the four-year period of lower pay to two years.
John Gradek, who teaches aviation management at McGill University, says as many as 2,000 of Air Canada’s roughly 5,200 active pilots may earn entry-level wages following a recent hiring surge.
After the airline averted a strike this week, Gradek says the failure to ditch the pay grade restrictions could prompt pushback from rank-and-file flight crew and jeopardize the deal, which is up for a vote next month.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 18, 2024.
ROME (AP) — Salvatore “Totò” Schillaci, the Italy striker who was top scorer at its home World Cup in 1990, has died. He was 59.
Schillaci had been hospitalized in Palermo following treatment for colon cancer.
The Palermo Civico hospital said in a statement that Schillacci died on Wednesday morning after being admitted 11 days ago.
Schillaci scored six goals for Italy during the 1990 World Cup. He came on as a substitute during Italy’s opener against Austria, scored in a 1-0 victory, and went on to earn the Golden Boot awarded to the tournament’s top scorer. He only scored one other goal for Italy in his career.
Italian soccer federation president Gabriele Gravina announced that a minute of silence would be held in memory of Schillaci before all games in the country for the rest of the week.
“The uncontrollable celebrations, in which his face was the symbol of shared joy, will remain forever part of Italian soccer (history),” Gravina said. “Totò was a great player, a symbol of tenacious desire and redemption. … His soccer was full of passion. And that fearless spirit made everyone appreciate him and will make him immortal.”
Schillaci also won the Golden Ball award at the 1990 World Cup as the tournament’s top player ahead of Lothar Matthaus and Diego Maradona.
Schillaci played for Messina, Juventus, Inter Milan and Japanese team Jubilo Iwata during his club career.
“You made an entire nation dream during the Magical Nights of Italia ’90,” Inter said on its social media channels.
West Germany won the 1990 World Cup, beating Argentina in the final, while Italy beat England for third place with a winning penalty kick from Schillaci.
Roberto Baggio, who scored Italy’s opening goal in the third-place match, wrote on Instagram, “Ciao my dear friend.”
Having been born and raised in Palermo, the Palermo soccer team announced that it would hold a public viewing of Schillaci at its Renzo Barbera stadium ahead of the funeral, the Gazzetta dello Sport reported.
French soccer player Wissam Ben Yedder will stay free ahead of his trial on charges of sexual assault while intoxicated, one of his lawyers told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
Marie Roumiantseva said Ben Yedder will remain under strict judicial supervision after a woman filed a lawsuit for sexual assault earlier this month.
The 34-year-old Ben Yedder, a prolific striker in the French league, was briefly detained then released after the alleged incident in his car on the French Riviera. Ben Yedder had been stopped by police after he first refused to do so. He was then put in a jail cell.
After he was summoned to appear in court on Oct. 15 and placed under judicial supervision, the Nice prosecutor’s office appealed the decision not to remand the player in custody. The investigative chamber of the Court of Appeal of Aix-en-Provence did not grant this request and kept Ben Yedder under judicial supervision.
Ben Yedder attended a hearing Tuesday during which he offered to go to rehab. He has admitted he drove while under the influence of alcohol but has denied any sexual assault.
In a separate legal case last year, Ben Yedder was charged with “rape, attempted rape and sexual assault” over another alleged incident in the south of France.
Ben Yedder has been without a club since his contract with Monaco expired at the end of last season.
