TORONTO —
Ontario logged fewer than 100 new cases of COVID-19 on Monday and Tuesday following a spike in daily case counts earlier this long weekend.
Provincial health officials confirmed 88 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Monday and 91 new cases on Tuesday.
On Sunday, health officials reported 116 new cases, while 124 were reported on Saturday and 134 were reported on Friday.
Before that, on Wednesday and Thursday, officials had been reporting fewer than 100 new cases. This had marked the first time since the end of March where the province saw a daily case count below 100.
The province reported zero new deaths related to the disease on Monday, but reported four new deaths on Tuesday, bringing the province’s death toll up to 2,782.
The total number of lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Ontario now stands at 39,628, including deaths and 35,601 recoveries.
The majority of Monday’s and Tuesday’s COVID-19 patients are between the ages of 20 and 59.
On Monday, 23 of the patients were under the age of 20 while eight were over the age of 60. On Tuesday, 26 of the patients were under the age of 20 while 12 are over the age of 60.
Where are the new COVID-19 cases?
Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott said that 29 of the province’s 34 public health units have reported five or fewer new cases of the disease on Tuesday, with 16 of them reporting no new cases at all.
Of the new cases reported on Tuesday, 16 of the new cases were found in Peel Region, 22 were found in Toronto, and nine were found in Windsor-Essex, a region that has grappled with outbreaks among migrant workers.
On Monday, 10 of the new cases were found in Peel Region, 10 were found in Toronto, and nine were found in Windsor-Essex.
Other regions reporting more than nine novel coronavirus patients on Tuesday included Chatham-Kent (9). On Monday, Durham Region (9), Lambton Public Health (11) and Southwestern Public Health (11) reported cases numbers over nine.
Both Peel Region and Toronto moved to Stage 3 of the province’s economic reopening plan on Friday.
Windsor-Essex is the only region in Ontario that has remained in Stage 2.
There are 78 people currently being treated for COVID-19 in a hospital. Of those patients, 28 are in the intensive care unit and 15 are breathing with the assistance of a ventilator.
Today, 29 of 34 public health units are reporting five or fewer cases, with 16 of them reporting no new cases. This morning, we announced that Windsor-Essex will remain in Stage 2 as we continue to support local efforts to stop the spread of #COVID19. https://t.co/PE5VOrYzkB
HALIFAX – Police have accused a Nova Scotia man of murdering a woman reported missing from the province’s Annapolis Valley after U.S. authorities detained a suspect at the Houston airport as he was preparing to board a flight to Mexico.
The RCMP say they charged 54-year-old Dale Allen Toole with first-degree murder after he was extradited by U.S. authorities and landed at Pearson International Airport in Toronto on Thursday.
RCMP Insp. Murray Marcichiw said investigators have yet to find the body of 55-year-old Esther Jones, but he said police believe there was sufficient evidence to lay the murder charge.
The search for Jones began on Labour Day after family members reported her missing.
RCMP Cpl. Jeff MacFarlane, lead investigator in the case, says Jones was last seen Aug. 31 at the Kingston Bible College in Greenwood, N.S.
MacFarlane says the accused, who is from Tremont, N.S., was not a suspect until police received key information from the Jones family and the community.
He said police executed a number of search warrants at locations in and around Annapolis County, including the communities of Kingston, Greenwood and South Tremont.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
MONTREAL – The Quebec government says Canada’s special representative on combating Islamophobia must resign, after she sent a letter to college and university heads recommending the hiring of more Muslim, Arab and Palestinian professors.
The existence of the letter, dated Aug. 30, was first reported by Le Journal de Québec, and a Canadian Heritage spokesperson says it was sent to institutions across the country.
In her letter, Amira Elghawaby says that since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas in October 2023, a dangerous climate has arisen on campuses.
She says to ease tensions educational institutions should be briefed on civil liberties and Islamophobia, and that they should hire more professors of Muslim, Arab and Palestinian origin.
It was this reference to hiring that drew the immediate indignation of Quebec’s higher education minister, who called on Elghawaby to resign, saying she should “mind her own business.”
Minister Pascale Déry says hiring professors based on religion goes against the principles of secularism the province adheres to.
Speaking to reporters in the Montreal area, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said that while each university will make its own hires, Elghawaby’s role is to make recommendations and encourage dialogue between different groups.
Later in Repentigny, Que., Premier François Legault criticized Trudeau for defending Elghawaby “in the name of diversity” and refusing to call for her resignation.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
VANCOUVER – A report into a triple stabbing at a festival in Vancouver’s Chinatown last year says the man accused of the crimes had been let out of a psychiatric care facility 99 times in the year prior without incident.
The report, authored by former Abbotsford Police chief Bob Rich, says the suspect in the stabbing, Blair Donnelly, was on his 100th unescorted leave from the BC Forensic Psychiatric Hospital on Sept. 10, 2023, when he allegedly stabbed three festivalgoers at the Light Up Chinatown Festival.
The external review, ordered by the provincial government after the stabbings, says Donnelly was found not criminally responsible for killing his daughter in 2006 while “suffering from a psychotic delusion that God wanted him to kill her.”
Rich’s report makes several recommendations to better handle “higher-risk patients,” including bolstering their care teams, improving policies around granting patient leaves, shoring up staff training in forensics and the use of “risk-management tools,” such as GPS tracking systems.
The B.C. Ministry of Health says it has accepted all of Rich’s recommendations and has already begun implementing them including “following new polices for granting leave privileges at the hospital.”
Court records show Donnelly is due back in Vancouver provincial court in March 2025.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
