The waning effectiveness of vaccines to stop the spread of the highly infectious Omicron variant of COVID-19 could mean it’s time for federal policy makers to consider lifting vaccine mandates, some experts suggest.
“It’s hard to really justify our mandates anymore,” said Dr Zain Chagla, an infectious diseases physician at St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton and an associate professor at McMaster University.
Toronto’s Pearson International Airport has recently been a scene of snarling air passenger traffic, causing long lineups and major delays.
While government officials have blamed staffing shortages for problems, some industry groups and politicians are laying the blame on COVID-related border restrictions, including vaccine mandates that require travellers to prove their vaccine status using an app before entering Canada.
Prevent severe illness and death
Scientists stress that the vaccines do hold up against what matters — severe illness, hospitalization and death.
And Chagla said that when the Alpha and Delta variants of COVID-19 swept through, data showed that vaccination had a “profound effect” on stopping a significant amount of infections, and that people’s ability to transmit was reduced.
Travellers entering Canada must still upload proof of their vaccinations into the ArriveCan mobile app, above. (Government Of Canada)
But the vaccines’ abilities to prevent transmission of the virus changed with the Omicron variant, he says.
Last month, in a editorial for the Globe and Mail, under the headline: “The logic behind vaccine mandates for travellers no longer holds,” Chagla wrote that with the Omicron variant, vaccine efficacy “wanes significantly” to help prevent transmission. He pointed to data from the UK Health Security Agency that he said showed the effectiveness of two or three doses of vaccine against spreading the Omicron-variant infection over time approaches zero.
“We live in a world now where a lot of people have either been vaccinated or got COVID, that maybe one to two per cent of people isn’t in that category,” he told CBC News. “Are we really working hard to make sure that they’re not able to access a flight?” he said.
“They’re not necessarily at an increased risk of transmission as compared to the fully vaccinated person against the next variant.”
WATCH | Long lines frustrate passengers at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport:
Frustrations mount over delays at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport
2 days ago
Duration 10:30
Extremely long wait times affecting arriving and departing passengers at Toronto’s Pearson airport are likely to continue until Labour Day, a former Air Canada executive says.
Proof-of-vaccine certificates to enter public places have been largely removed in all provinces Canada. The remaining proof-of-vaccination policy requirement applies to federally regulated employees and for travel, especially by air overseas and to enter Canada.
However, the Public Health Agency of Canada recently announced that COVID-19 restrictions at the border will remain in place for at least another month. Those restrictions include vaccine mandates, which require travellers to use the ArriveCan mobile app to download proof of their vaccination before entering Canada.
Those who do not are subject to testing and quarantine.
Even as Omicron dominates, the vaccines are holding up against what matters — severe illness, hospitalization and death, experts say. (Ted Aljibe/AFP/Getty Images)
Conservative motion shot down
The Canadian Airports Council and the Canadian Travel and Tourism Roundtable, an industry group formed during the COVID-19 pandemic, are among the industry organizations calling for vaccine mandates to be dropped.
WestJet Airlines has also called for the removal of mandates. Meanwhile, a federal Conservative motion calling for the removal of pandemic-related restrictions, including vaccine mandates, was shot down last month.
But Dr. Nazeem Muhajarine, professor of community health and epidemiology at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, said that some research does indicate that vaccine booster doses do protect people from transmission of the virus.
“This last remaining vaccine policy should remain a little longer because the threat of COVID-19 and the harm it causes in terms of long COVID, deaths and hospitalization particularly in vulnerable people, elderly and in some cases in children hasn’t entirely disappeared,” he said.
Yet, Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease physician and senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security in Baltimore, Md., questioned the value those mandates now serve in light of the Omicron variant and population immunity.
“I think that increasingly it’s become less valuable than it was in the earlier eras in the pandemic, because the vaccine in the face of Omicron isn’t very great at protecting against infection, he said.
‘Much less value’ for travel
Because the vaccines hold up against severe illness, hospitalization and death, Adalja said there is still great value for employers to insist their workforce be vaccinated from a work-safety standpoint.
As for vaccine mandates for travel, “I think it has much less value,” he said. “I don’t think the ArriveCan [app] serves the same value that it once did.”
Appearing before a House of Commons health committee earlier this week,Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam said the mandates were first implemented when there was a strong resurgence of the Delta variant and two doses of vaccines were very effective.
Chief Public Health Officer Theresa Tam said the mandates were first implemented when there was a strong resurgence of the Delta variant and two doses of vaccines were very effective. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)
But Omicron was the “game changer,” she said.
“Given the reduced vaccine effectiveness, even with three doses against the Omicron variant, vaccines cannot prevent all transmissions alone,” she said.
“So, a layered approach has to be considered, including layering mask wearing, for instance. But these are the things that the relevant ministers need to consider.”
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese technology group SoftBank swung back to profitability in the July-September quarter, boosted by positive results in its Vision Fund investments.
Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. reported Tuesday a fiscal second quarter profit of nearly 1.18 trillion yen ($7.7 billion), compared with a 931 billion yen loss in the year-earlier period.
Quarterly sales edged up about 6% to nearly 1.77 trillion yen ($11.5 billion).
SoftBank credited income from royalties and licensing related to its holdings in Arm, a computer chip-designing company, whose business spans smartphones, data centers, networking equipment, automotive, consumer electronic devices, and AI applications.
The results were also helped by the absence of losses related to SoftBank’s investment in office-space sharing venture WeWork, which hit the previous fiscal year.
WeWork, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023, emerged from Chapter 11 in June.
SoftBank has benefitted in recent months from rising share prices in some investment, such as U.S.-based e-commerce company Coupang, Chinese mobility provider DiDi Global and Bytedance, the Chinese developer of TikTok.
SoftBank’s financial results tend to swing wildly, partly because of its sprawling investment portfolio that includes search engine Yahoo, Chinese retailer Alibaba, and artificial intelligence company Nvidia.
SoftBank makes investments in a variety of companies that it groups together in a series of Vision Funds.
The company’s founder, Masayoshi Son, is a pioneer in technology investment in Japan. SoftBank Group does not give earnings forecasts.
Shopify Inc. executives brushed off concerns that incoming U.S. President Donald Trump will be a major detriment to many of the company’s merchants.
“There’s nothing in what we’ve heard from Trump, nor would there have been anything from (Democratic candidate) Kamala (Harris), which we think impacts the overall state of new business formation and entrepreneurship,” Shopify’s chief financial officer Jeff Hoffmeister told analysts on a call Tuesday.
“We still feel really good about all the merchants out there, all the entrepreneurs that want to start new businesses and that’s obviously not going to change with the administration.”
Hoffmeister’s comments come a week after Trump, a Republican businessman, trounced Harris in an election that will soon return him to the Oval Office.
On the campaign trail, he threatened to impose tariffs of 60 per cent on imports from China and roughly 10 per cent to 20 per cent on goods from all other countries.
If the president-elect makes good on the promise, many worry the cost of operating will soar for companies, including customers of Shopify, which sells e-commerce software to small businesses but also brands as big as Kylie Cosmetics and Victoria’s Secret.
These merchants may feel they have no choice but to pass on the increases to customers, perhaps sparking more inflation.
If Trump’s tariffs do come to fruition, Shopify’s president Harley Finkelstein pointed out China is “not a huge area” for Shopify.
However, “we can’t anticipate what every presidential administration is going to do,” he cautioned.
He likened the uncertainty facing the business community to the COVID-19 pandemic where Shopify had to help companies migrate online.
“Our job is no matter what comes the way of our merchants, we provide them with tools and service and support for them to navigate it really well,” he said.
Finkelstein was questioned about the forthcoming U.S. leadership change on a call meant to delve into Shopify’s latest earnings, which sent shares soaring 27 per cent to $158.63 shortly after Tuesday’s market open.
The Ottawa-based company, which keeps its books in U.S. dollars, reported US$828 million in net income for its third quarter, up from US$718 million in the same quarter last year, as its revenue rose 26 per cent.
Revenue for the period ended Sept. 30 totalled US$2.16 billion, up from US$1.71 billion a year earlier.
Subscription solutions revenue reached US$610 million, up from US$486 million in the same quarter last year.
Merchant solutions revenue amounted to US$1.55 billion, up from US$1.23 billion.
Shopify’s net income excluding the impact of equity investments totalled US$344 million for the quarter, up from US$173 million in the same quarter last year.
Daniel Chan, a TD Cowen analyst, said the results show Shopify has a leadership position in the e-commerce world and “a continued ability to gain market share.”
In its outlook for its fourth quarter of 2024, the company said it expects revenue to grow at a mid-to-high-twenties percentage rate on a year-over-year basis.
“Q4 guidance suggests Shopify will finish the year strong, with better-than-expected revenue growth and operating margin,” Chan pointed out in a note to investors.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
TORONTO – RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust says it has cut almost 10 per cent of its staff as it deals with a slowdown in the condo market and overall pushes for greater efficiency.
The company says the cuts, which amount to around 60 employees based on its last annual filing, will mean about $9 million in restructuring charges and should translate to about $8 million in annualized cash savings.
The job cuts come as RioCan and others scale back condo development plans as the market softens, but chief executive Jonathan Gitlin says the reductions were from a companywide efficiency effort.
RioCan says it doesn’t plan to start any new construction of mixed-use properties this year and well into 2025 as it adjusts to the shifting market demand.
The company reported a net income of $96.9 million in the third quarter, up from a loss of $73.5 million last year, as it saw a $159 million boost from a favourable change in the fair value of investment properties.
RioCan reported what it says is a record-breaking 97.8 per cent occupancy rate in the quarter including retail committed occupancy of 98.6 per cent.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
