A top U.S. health expert who was among the first to sound the alarm about the COVID-19 pandemic last year is now raising concerns about the spread of the P.1 variant in Canada, warning the country is acting too slowly.
“It’s not good,” he said. “We’ve known for quite a while how bad this variant is. But there has been a reluctance to follow the science on this.”
For the past two weeks, his focus has been on Canadian provinces that are seeing outbreaks of P.1, a virus variant first identified in Brazil that is now spreading rapidly in British Columbia and growing roots in Alberta and Ontario.
The number of cases of the P.1 variant reported in B.C. alone has exploded over the past few weeks, hitting 737 as of Monday — nearly double the number reported before the start of the Easter long weekend.
Monday saw B.C. hit a new all-time record for intensive care patients impacted by COVID-19, with 96 people currently receiving critical care.
That record was predicted in late March by Sally Otto, a University of British Columbia mathematical biologist who has done COVID-19 modelling. She said the ICU surge would likely be fuelled by multiple variants, include P.1.
Feigl-Ding was also sounding the alarm about the situation in B.C. around the same time. On March 26, he pointed out on CNN that the province was seeing more daily cases of the P.1 variant — between 20 and 30 — than the entire United States combined.
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Let this sink in—
The more contagious #P1 variant from Brazil has now invaded N America—British Columbia???????? has a sudden cluster of 215+ new #P1 cases sequenced by one Vancouver lab.#P1 is more contagious, has reinfection risk and possibly more severe.????pic.twitter.com/CKGI3umuk5
Feigl-Ding also points to a BC Centre for Disease Control report from March 24 that identified 84 cases of P.1 that were not linked to returning travellers — strongly suggesting community spread.
“I can’t believe (B.C. public health officials) didn’t act then” and impose harsher restrictions, he told Global News. “And now here we have all this mess.”
The situation in B.C. still pales in comparison to the crisis the P.1 variant has sparked in Brazil.
The country is now seeing the worst wave of the pandemic yet, reporting an average of over 3,000 deaths per day.
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The World Health Organization on Thursday said Brazilian hospitals were in critical condition, with many intensive care units over 90 per cent full. National media and public health institutions have called the situation a “collapse” of the health-care system.
3) I’m not exaggerating that hospitals in Brazil are in collapse. This is the headline of a major newspaper. pic.twitter.com/86lFKsFuAy
Yet Feigl-Ding says the fate of Brazil — whose president Jair Bolsonaro refuses to support masks and lockdowns — can be avoided in Canada by expanding contact tracing and toughening restrictions.
“Beyond banning indoor dining, there needs to be masking in schools,” Feigl-Ding said. “None of this ‘middle school or higher, only fourth grade or higher.’ No, every grade. Everyone down to the age of five, I think, is really, really key.”
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The U.S. Centers for Disease Control has gone even further, saying anyone over the age of two should be wearing a mask.
B.C. provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry imposed a ban on indoor dining in restaurants and bars on March 29.
That same day, she also expanded mask requirements in schools to cover students Grade 4 and above, along with all school staff. Before then, masks were only recommended for elementary students while mandatory for kids in middle and high school, and only when students were away from their desks.
Henry said further actions regarding schools won’t be revisited until April 19, which Feigl-Ding says is a “head-scratching” mistake.
“It’s one thing to say: ‘follow the science,’” he said. “You need to follow the fast-changing and updating science. As a public health leader, that’s part of your job.”
Feigl-Ding’s advice also extends to officials in other provinces like Ontario, where over 100 cases of P.1 have been confirmed, and Alberta, which has seen 15 cases to date.
Alberta chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw said Monday that the outbreak in that province, which she called “significant” over the weekend, appears to be linked to a large employer with multiple sites across Western Canada. She said it’s believed to have started with a traveller who returned to Alberta from out of province.
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3:12 Growing number of younger Canadians in hospital, infected with variants
Growing number of younger Canadians in hospital, infected with variants
While Ontario tightened restrictions over the weekend, leaders in Alberta and other provinces have voiced opposition to further lockdowns or backtracking on their reopenings.
Last week, Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe said the “way through this (pandemic) is vaccines. The way through this is not to increase public-health measures.”
But Feigl-Ding says a mixture of both are needed until herd immunity is reached. And because P.1 is more transmissible and deadly than the original virus strain, that will require a higher percentage of the population to be vaccinated.
“And Canada is not even close to that point yet,” he said. “Even if you get there, it will only slow the ongoing virus outbreak. It won’t stop it in its tracks.
“There’s no easy way to say this, but we have to be vigilant until vaccinations have reached a high threshold, and only then can we slightly let up on the gas. You have to do it at a slow, low level, not in the middle of a wildfire.”
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— with files from Global’s Rachael D’Amore and Reuters
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.
