The co-chair of the federal task force studying COVID-19 immunity is warning that the arrival of vaccines in Canada doesn’t guarantee protection against the virus, or signal that peoples’ lives will soon return to normal.
Dr. Catherine Hankins told CBC’s The House that there are still too many unknowns about COVID-19 immunity and the effectiveness of vaccines to quickly move beyond the pandemic measures now in place, such as mask mandates and limits on social and business activities.
“We still have a lot of questions about immunity, even from natural infection with the wild virus. How long does protection last? Is it boosted when you get exposed again? What will be the impact if you get a vaccine and you’ve had a previous COVID-19 infection?” Hankins said in an interview airing Saturday.
“But we’re working really hard now on looking at how we can differentiate the natural immunity from the vaccine-induced immunity.”
Dr. Catherine Hankins and other members of the federal COVID-19 task force are trying to determine whether immunity obtained through a vaccine is different from immunity resulting from an infection.
Many medical experts see the arrival next week of the first doses of a vaccine produced by Pfizer-BioNTech as a light at the end of the tunnel — the beginning of the end of the pandemic.
Canada is expected to receive up to 249,000 doses before the end of the year.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Thursday that “the first 30,000 doses are expected to arrive on Canadian soil in just a few days” and the vaccine will be “free for Canadians,” with the federal government covering the costs.
Each province will decide who gets priority access to the vaccine.
Millions of additional doses will arrive in the months ahead now that Health Canada has approved the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. The Trudeau government also signed agreements with other vaccine manufacturers that are now under review by regulators — including one with Moderna. Canada has a contract to buy up to 56 million doses of Moderna’s product.
Both the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are reported to be about 95 per cent effective.
CBC News: The House9:53Dr. Catherine Hankins on vaccine immunity
The co-chair of Canada’s COVID-19 Immunity Task Force discusses what the recent approval of the Pfizer vaccine and impending inoculations mean for a return to normal life. 9:53
How long does immunity last?
Hankins agreed that the news on the vaccine front is exciting. The work of her immunity task force in the weeks and months ahead, she said, is to understand any differences in levels of immunity between those who have recovered from COVID-19 and those who have received the vaccine.
“We’ll be looking [at], for those that have had infection and for those that have had the vaccine, what is the durability of that protection that they’re getting?” she said.
“How long does it last? How does it respond if they get re-exposed in the community? Do they get a boost when they get re-exposed? Do they get worse symptoms? These are things we need to determine.”
Health experts aren’t the only ones asking these questions. Governments and businesses are looking ahead already to the vaccine as a kind of passport for any number of activities.
An ‘immunity passport’ and civil rights
Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott confirmed this week that the province intends to issue some sort of ‘proof of vaccination’ to those who get the shot. She called it an essential tool.
“It’s going to be really important for people to have for travel purposes, perhaps for work purposes, for going to theatres, cinemas or any other places where people will be in closer physical contact when we get through the worst of the pandemic,” she said.
Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott has been musing about offering people some form of ‘proof of vaccination.’ (Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press)
The Canadian Civil Liberties Association insists the idea of a vaccine certificate or immunity passport is a violation of Canadians’ rights.
“It discriminates. It violates privacy and dignity. It’s coercive and it violates Canadians’ mobility rights,” the association’s executive director, Michael Bryant, told The House this week.
“Just because we are seeking herd immunity from a virus doesn’t mean we require herd mentality to mark people with the scarlet letter of COVID. We live in a free and democratic society, and that means we don’t publicly stratify the population on the basis of their private health status, even if it’s a private health status that poses a hypothetical risk to others.”
‘It’s not absolute proof of protection’
Hankins said those concerns are legitimate.
“I think this requires an all-of-society discussion about how we’re going to do this, because it’s not just proof of vaccination. I mean, if you’ve had COVID-19, you’ve got a level of immunity as well,” she told The House.
“So we’re going to have to think about how we do this in such a way that it is not coercive and that people understand that it’s not absolute proof of protection either.”
At a news conference on Friday, Prime Minister Trudeau repeated his call for Canadians to remain vigilant and respect public health guidelines.
“We’ve reserved enough doses so that every Canadian who wants a vaccine will be able to get it before the end of 2021. Vaccinations will help end the pandemic, but right now, our fight against COVID-19 is far from over. Again this week, far too many provinces reported record highs in cases and hospitalizations. These numbers must go down.”
Hankins said it will be a while yet before Canadians can get their lives back to what they were pre-pandemic.
“And we all know, we’re heading towards the shortest day in the year. This is a cold, dark winter ahead of us … we really need to buckle down and do everything we’re being told to do,” she said.
In the meantime, Hankins suggested Canadians make an effort to be socially connected while remaining physically distanced as the holiday season approaches.
As gifts go, it may not sound like much. But in the middle of a second pandemic wave, it might be the best gift we could get.
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.
