The latest news on COVID-19 developments in Canada (all times Eastern):
3:45 p.m.
Nunavut is reporting three new COVID-19 cases in the Hudson Bay community of Arviat.
Arviat is the only community in Nunavut with active COVID-19 infections, with today’s count standing at 11.
Nunavut has had 311 confirmed COVID-19 cases, 299 of which are considered resolved.
The territory says it has administered 6,205 doses of a COVID-19 vaccine so far.
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2:15 p.m.
Manitoba officials are reporting five new deaths in people with COVID-19 and 79 additional cases of the virus.
They say 44 of the new cases are in the Northern health region, while much of the remainder of new diagnoses are in the Winnipeg area.
The province says Winnipeg’s five-day test positivity rate is 3.9 per cent, while the province-wide rate is higher at 5.2 per cent.
Manitoba’s daily COVID-19 update notes that with 1,580 COVID-19 tests that were performed on Saturday, the province has now completed 500,840 tests since early February 2020.
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12:50 p.m.
Health officials in Newfoundland and Labrador are reporting 11 new cases of COVID-19 today after the daily case count shot up to 100 late last week.
Ten of the cases were identified in the St. John’s region, the site of a recent major outbreak in the province.
There are now 296 active cases of COVID-19 in the province.
Officials are also notifying rotational workers who’ve been to the Brucejack gold mine in British Columbia and have returned to the province in the last 14 days to isolate away from family and complete a full quarantine after an outbreak was identified at the mine.
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12 p.m.
The Ontario government has identified the next groups in line to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
The province’s vaccine taskforce released the list in a memo sent to regional public health officers today.
Ongoing vaccine shipment delays forced the province to concentrate its inoculation efforts on long-term care residents in recent weeks.
But today’s memo says immediate priority should now be given to staff and essential caregivers in long-term care, high-risk retirement and First Nations elder care homes, and any residents of these settings that have not yet received a first dose of vaccine.
Hospital patients who have confirmed admission to a nursing home, high priority health care workers, and Indigenous adults in remote communities are also now cleared to start receiving initial doses of a COVID-19 vaccine.
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11:20 a.m.
Quebec is reporting 910 new cases of COVID-19 as well as 15 additional deaths linked to the pandemic.
Two of the deaths occurred in the last 24 hours while the rest happened earlier.
Hospitalizations dropped by seven to 805, with 132 people in intensive care, which is two more than the day before.
Two deaths previously attributed to COVID-19 were found to be unrelated and removed from the list, bringing the provincial total to 10,214 deaths and 276,790 cases since the pandemic began.
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11:15 a.m.
New Brunswick is reporting 2 new cases of COVID-19 today, a significant drop from the 16 reported on Saturday.
The two cases were identified in the Edmundston region bordering Quebec.
There are 150 active cases of the disease in the province.
Six patients are hospitalized, two of whom are in intensive care.
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10:50 a.m.
Health officials in Nova Scotia are reporting one new case of COVID-19 today.
The case is related to travel outside the Atlantic region and the individual involved is in self-isolation.
The active case count in the province has dropped to nine cases from the 10 reported on Saturday.
Nova Scotia completed 1,429 COVID-19 tests yesterday.
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10:45 a.m.
Ontario is reporting 981 new cases of COVID-19 today and 42 more deaths linked to the virus.
Health Minister Christine Elliott says there are 122 new cases in Toronto, 209 in Peel Region, and 171 in York Region.
The province says 48,701 tests were completed since the last daily update.
Meanwhile, health authorities in North Bay, Ont., say a case of the COVID-19 variant first identified in South Africa has been identified among the city’s current infections.
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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 14, 2021
VANCOUVER – Contract negotiations resume today in Vancouver in a labour dispute that has paralyzed container cargo shipping at British Columbia’s ports since Monday.
The BC Maritime Employers Association and International Longshore and Warehouse Union Local 514 are scheduled to meet for the next three days in mediated talks to try to break a deadlock in negotiations.
The union, which represents more than 700 longshore supervisors at ports, including Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Nanaimo, has been without a contract since March last year.
The latest talks come after employers locked out workers in response to what it said was “strike activity” by union members.
The start of the lockout was then followed by several days of no engagement between the two parties, prompting federal Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon to speak with leaders on both sides, asking them to restart talks.
MacKinnon had said that the talks were “progressing at an insufficient pace, indicating a concerning absence of urgency from the parties involved” — a sentiment echoed by several business groups across Canada.
In a joint letter, more than 100 organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Business Council of Canada and associations representing industries from automotive and fertilizer to retail and mining, urged the government to do whatever it takes to end the work stoppage.
“While we acknowledge efforts to continue with mediation, parties have not been able to come to a negotiated agreement,” the letter says. “So, the federal government must take decisive action, using every tool at its disposal to resolve this dispute and limit the damage caused by this disruption.
“We simply cannot afford to once again put Canadian businesses at risk, which in turn puts Canadian livelihoods at risk.”
In the meantime, the union says it has filed a complaint to the Canada Industrial Relations Board against the employers, alleging the association threatened to pull existing conditions out of the last contract in direct contact with its members.
“The BCMEA is trying to undermine the union by attempting to turn members against its democratically elected leadership and bargaining committee — despite the fact that the BCMEA knows full well we received a 96 per cent mandate to take job action if needed,” union president Frank Morena said in a statement.
The employers have responded by calling the complaint “another meritless claim,” adding the final offer to the union that includes a 19.2 per cent wage increase over a four-year term remains on the table.
“The final offer has been on the table for over a week and represents a fair and balanced proposal for employees, and if accepted would end this dispute,” the employers’ statement says. “The offer does not require any concessions from the union.”
The union says the offer does not address the key issue of staffing requirement at the terminals as the port introduces more automation to cargo loading and unloading, which could potentially require fewer workers to operate than older systems.
The Port of Vancouver is the largest in Canada and has seen a number of labour disruptions, including two instances involving the rail and grain storage sectors earlier this year.
A 13-day strike by another group of workers at the port last year resulted in the disruption of a significant amount of shipping and trade.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
The Royal Canadian Legion says a new partnership with e-commerce giant Amazon is helping boost its veterans’ fund, and will hopefully expand its donor base in the digital world.
Since the Oct. 25 launch of its Amazon.ca storefront, the legion says it has received nearly 10,000 orders for poppies.
Online shoppers can order lapel poppies on Amazon in exchange for donations or buy items such as “We Remember” lawn signs, Remembrance Day pins and other accessories, with all proceeds going to the legion’s Poppy Trust Fund for Canadian veterans and their families.
Nujma Bond, the legion’s national spokesperson, said the organization sees this move as keeping up with modern purchasing habits.
“As the world around us evolves we have been looking at different ways to distribute poppies and to make it easier for people to access them,” she said in an interview.
“This is definitely a way to reach a wider number of Canadians of all ages. And certainly younger Canadians are much more active on the web, on social media in general, so we’re also engaging in that way.”
Al Plume, a member of a legion branch in Trenton, Ont., said the online store can also help with outreach to veterans who are far from home.
“For veterans that are overseas and are away, (or) can’t get to a store they can order them online, it’s Amazon.” Plume said.
Plume spent 35 years in the military with the Royal Engineers, and retired eight years ago. He said making sure veterans are looked after is his passion.
“I’ve seen the struggles that our veterans have had with Veterans Affairs … and that’s why I got involved, with making sure that the people get to them and help the veterans with their paperwork.”
But the message about the Amazon storefront didn’t appear to reach all of the legion’s locations, with volunteers at Branch 179 on Vancouver’s Commercial Drive saying they hadn’t heard about the online push.
Holly Paddon, the branch’s poppy campaign co-ordinator and bartender, said the Amazon partnership never came up in meetings with other legion volunteers and officials.
“I work at the legion, I work with the Vancouver poppy office and I go to the meetings for the Vancouver poppy campaign — which includes all the legions in Vancouver — and not once has this been mentioned,” she said.
Paddon said the initiative is a great idea, but she would like to have known more about it.
The legion also sells a larger collection of items at poppystore.ca.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2024.
