Living abroad during a global health crisis can create concerns about whether coming back home is the best option.
For many Canadians who’ve spent years away, returning to North America amid the coronavirus outbreak may not be ideal, or even possible.
“I am not expecting Canada to fly people out anytime soon,” said Jason So, a Torontonian who has lived in Seoul, South Korea, for more than eight years.
“I am more worried about flights being blocked for us to leave commercially or the costs associated with self-isolation for two weeks when — and if— I return to Canada,” he explained.
Coming back to Canadian soil could risk his family’s health, and he doesn’t have a place to return to, said So, 34.
South Korea is one of the countries most impacted by the spread of the coronavirus (referred to officially as COVID-19), with more than 6,000 cases reported.
Officials there have been praised for administering more than 140,000 tests for the virus, resulting in a low death rate and the number of cases dropping in the last few days. Although there’s been a comparatively high number of infections in South Korea, So says his day-to-day life in the country where he runs a restaurant hasn’t changed drastically. “Seoul does not feel like it’s dangerous or a fearful place to be, it is very orderly and everyone is taking it one day at a time,” he said to Global News via e-mail.
Canadian officials evacuated hundreds of its citizens out of Wuhan, China, the epicentre of the COVID-19 outbreak, last month along with those on the Diamond Princess cruise ship docked in Japan. When they returned all had to engage in a 14-day quarantine to ensure they posed no risk to the public.
Returning back to Canada simply isn’t practical at the moment, but the mood in South Korea is one of concern, said So.
1:02 Coronavirus outbreak: WHO says the world is ‘on the verge of reaching 100000 cases’
Coronavirus outbreak: WHO says the world is ‘on the verge of reaching 100000 cases’
“Most busy and bustling places are very empty these days so the effects on retail and food and beverage is of great concern on top of all the health risks involved with this virus,” he said.
Story continues below advertisement
There has been xenophobia against Chinese people and come cafes are refusing customers from China, he said.
“Expats are trying their best to avoid going out like most locals in Korea,” he added.
As he runs a business in South Korea, his feelings on whether he wants to stay will be more dependent on whether he can withstand an economic downturn, he explained. “Or I could cut my losses and be home with family, where I obviously would feel safer,” he said.
‘There’s no reason to come home’
Leora Courtney-Wolfman says she feels comfortable in Austria. Supplied by Leora Courtney-Wolfman
Supplied by Leora Courtney-Wolfman
Canadian Leora Courtney-Wolfman lives in Vienna, Austria, where there are currently 55 confirmed cases of the coronavirus. But what might be more concerning is the tiny European country borders Italy, where around 4,000 people have been infected and nearly 200 have died.
Story continues below advertisement
“With being near Italy, the Viennese are kind of famous for being blase, very indifferent and not making a big deal about things,” said Courtney-Wolfman, 35.
Many seem fairly tense and hand sanitizer is being marked-up in stores. But overall, most are calm, she explained. However, the side of the country that’s closer to Italy may be behaving differently, she added.
To those in Vienna, Italy seems as far away as Vancouver does for Torontonians, she explained.
Originally from Toronto, Courtney-Wolfman has lived in Vienna for seven years and works as a demographic researcher. She has no plans to return to Ontario amid the coronavirus outbreak.
“There’s no reason to come home. I’ve been following the story in Toronto out of interest … It seems they’ve developed a response plan after SARS that’s doing well,” she said.
“We will have to see what happens in Vienna. It’s a great city to live in, but there’s a lot more people in all of Europe in a much smaller space than Canada.”
One positive about living in Austria, as opposed to Canada, is that the work culture has always encouraged employees to stay home if they are sick, she said.
Story continues below advertisement
“If you have a mild headache or cough, you’re not going to come into work for a few days … there’s no pressure,” she said.
“People are less worried because if you’re sick, you don’t see anyone until you’re better. A lot of Canadian cities, you feel guilted into coming into work,” she explained.
Kevin Caners, originally from Brockville, Ont., has called Berlin home six years and says the extent of the coronavirus impact is starting to feel more omnipresent.
“It depends a lot on your particular community. The general [mood] is a little on edge or expectant, there’s definitely been shortages all over the city,” he said. Products like pasta, rice and flour have been sold out across Berlin, he explained.
Caners says he and his girlfriend just bought tickets to come home to Canada for a short visit this June. Those travel plans were on his agenda before the virus, he explained.
Kevin Caners says he plans to come back to Canada on a planned vacation there. Photo by: Christina Peters.
Story continues below advertisement
“I’m personally dreaming, hoping, expecting that it will eventually blow over. I have no actual idea, but I have a hunch eventually it will blow over,” he said.
“I’m 34, so I’m not in the high at-risk community or demographic, so that plays into it. If I was older or had health complications, I’d be much more concerned.”
‘Everyone is working together’
After living in South Korea for nearly two years, Evan Przesiecki says he’s not overly concerned about his safety in the country.
He teaches English in Seoul, South Korea, and has returned to Canada once in 2018 for the Christmas holidays.
The government is taking the necessary precautions and public schools across South Korea have closed to encourage teachers and students to stay at home,” he said.
“Above this, workers like myself are still being paid during this unexpected time off, so financially things are sound too.”
Even though South Korea has faced other outbreaks like SARS and H1N1, like many other countries, the current scenario seems unprecedented, he said.
“People are avoiding mass gatherings, like going to the movies … it’s a shame. Right now is usually a great time for tourism,” he said.
Story continues below advertisement
“But now everyone is working together to ensure that we control this situation as quickly as possible.”
Friends and family in Canada have asked Przesiecki if he’s nervous about the virus since the first cases were reported in Wuhan, he said. But the Korean government’s response has made him feel fairly comfortable where he is, he explained.
“I worked very hard to get my job here in Seoul, and I do have my life here at the moment. Korea has been so welcoming and good to me,” he said.
“It’s hard to just say I’ll drop a place I very much considered home at the moment when there are so many uncertainties.”
Living in Seoul as opposed to Daegu — the centre of Korea’s outbreak — has given Przesiecki some distance from the majority of those infected, he said.
Regardless of where you live, be informed of this virus, he said.
“It’s very important that everyone educates themselves about the situation and not to spread fear,” he said.
PHOENIX (AP) — Arizona voters have approved a constitutional amendment guaranteeing abortion access up to fetal viability, typically after 21 weeks — a major win for advocates of the measure in the presidential battleground state who have been seeking to expand access beyond the current 15-week limit.
Arizona was one of nine states with abortion on the ballot. Democrats have centered abortion rights in their campaigns since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. Abortion-rights supporters prevailed in all seven abortion ballot questions in 2022 and 2023, including in conservative-leaning states.
Arizona for Abortion Access, the coalition leading the state campaign, gathered well over the 383,923 signatures required to put it on the ballot, and the secretary of state’s office verified that enough were valid. The coalition far outpaced the opposition campaign, It Goes Too Far, in fundraising. The opposing campaign argued the measure was too far-reaching and cited its own polling in saying a majority of Arizonans support the 15-week limit. The measure allows post-viability abortions if they are necessary to protect the life or physical or mental health of the mother.
Access to abortion has been a cloudy issue in Arizona. In April, the state Supreme Court cleared the way for the enforcement of a long-dormant 1864 law banning nearly all abortions. The state Legislature swiftly repealed it.
Voters in Arizona are divided on abortion. Maddy Pennell, a junior at Arizona State University, said the possibility of a near-total abortion ban made her “depressed” and strengthened her desire to vote for the abortion ballot measure.
“I feel very strongly about having access to abortion,” she said.
Kyle Lee, an independent Arizona voter, does not support the abortion ballot measure.
“All abortion is pretty much, in my opinion, murder from beginning to end,” Lee said.
The Civil War-era ban also shaped the contours of tight legislative races. State Sen. Shawnna Bolick and state Rep. Matt Gress are among the handful of vulnerable Republican incumbents in competitive districts who crossed party lines to give the repeal vote the final push — a vote that will be tested as both parties vie for control of the narrowly GOP-held state Legislature.
Both of the Phoenix-area lawmakers were rebuked by some of their Republican colleagues for siding with Democrats. Gress made a motion on the House floor to initiate the repeal of the 1864 law. Bolick, explaining her repeal vote to her Senate colleagues, gave a 20-minute floor speech describing her three difficult pregnancies.
While Gress was first elected to his seat in 2022, Bolick is facing voters for the first time. She was appointed by the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors to fill a seat vacancy in 2023. She has not emphasized her role in the repeal vote as she has campaigned, instead playing up traditional conservative issues — one of her signs reads “Bolick Backs the Blue.”
Voters rejected a measure to eliminate retention elections for state Superior Court judges and Supreme Court justices.
The measure was put on the ballot by Republican legislators hoping to protect two conservative justices up for a routine retention vote who favored allowing the Civil War-era ban to be enforced — Shawnna Bolick’s husband, Supreme Court Justice Clint Bolick, and Justice Kathryn Hackett King. Since the measure did not pass, both are still vulnerable to voter ouster, though those races hadn’t been decided by early Wednesday morning.
Under the existing system, voters decide every four to six years whether judges and justices should remain on the bench. The proposed measure would have allowed the judges and justices to stay on the bench without a popular vote unless one is triggered by felony convictions, crimes involving fraud and dishonesty, personal bankruptcy or mortgage foreclosure.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska voters supported a measure Tuesday that enshrines the state’s current ban on abortions after the 12th week of pregnancy in the state constitution, and they rejected a competing measure that sought to expand abortion rights. Nebraska was the first state to have competing abortion amendments on the same ballot since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, ending the nationwide right to abortion and allowing states to decide for themselves. The dueling measures were among a record number of petition-initiated measures on Nebraska’s ballot Tuesday.
What were the competing abortion measures?
A majority of voters supported a measure enshrining the state’s current ban on abortion after the first 12 weeks of pregnancy in the state constitution. The measure will also allow for further restrictions. Last year, the Legislature passed the 12-week ban, which includes exceptions for cases of rape and incest and to protect the life of the pregnant woman.
Voters rejected the other abortion measure. If they had passed it by a larger number of “for” votes than the 12-week measure, it would have amended the constitution to guarantee the right to have an abortion until viability — the standard under Roe that is the point at which a fetus might survive outside the womb. Some babies can survive with medical help after 21 weeks of gestation.
Abortion was on the ballot in several other states, as well. Coming into the election, voters in all seven states that had decided on abortion-related ballot measures since the reversal of Roe had favored abortion rights, including in some conservative states.
Who is behind the Nebraska abortion measures?
The 12-week ban measure was bankrolled by some of Nebraska’s wealthiest people, including Republican Sen. Pete Ricketts, who previously served as governor and donated more than $1.1 million. His mother, Marlene Ricketts, gave $4 million to the cause. Members of the Peed family, which owns publishing company Sandhills Global, also gave $1 million.
The effort was organized under the name Protect Women and Children and was heavily backed by religious organizations, including the Nebraska Catholic Conference, a lobbying group that has organized rallies, phone banks and community townhalls to drum up support for the measure.
The effort to enshrine viability as the standard was called Protect Our Rights Nebraska and had the backing of several medical, advocacy and social justice groups. Planned Parenthood donated nearly $1 million to the cause, with the American Civil Liberties Union, I Be Black Girl, Nebraska Appleseed and the Women’s Fund of Omaha also contributing significantly to the roughly $3.7 million raised by Protect Our Rights.
What other initiatives were on Nebraska’s ballot?
Nebraska voters approved two measures Tuesday that will create a system for the use and manufacture of medical marijuana, if the measures survive an ongoing legal challenge.
The measures legalize the possession and use of medical marijuana, and allow for the manufacture, distribution and delivery of the drug. One would let patients and caregivers possess up to 5 ounces (142 grams) of marijuana if recommended by a doctor. The other would create the Nebraska Medical Cannabis Commission, which would oversee the private groups that would manufacture and dispense the drug.
Those initiatives were challenged over allegations that the petition campaign that put them on the ballot broke election rules. Nebraska’s attorney general said supporters of the measures may have submitted several thousand invalid signatures, and one man has been charged in connection with 164 allegedly fraudulent signatures. That means a judge could still invalidate the measures.
Voters also opted Tuesday to repeal a new conservative-backed law that allocates millions of dollars in taxpayer money to fund private school tuition.
Finally, they approved a measure that will require all Nebraska employers to provide at least 40 hours of paid sick leave to their employees.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Voters in Missouri cleared the way to undo one of the nation’s most restrictive abortion bans in one of seven victories for abortion rights advocates, while Florida, Nebraska and South Dakota defeated similar constitutional amendments, leaving bans in place.
Abortion rights amendments also passed in Arizona, Colorado, Maryland and Montana. Nevada voters also approved an amendment, but they’ll need to pass it again it 2026 for it to take effect. Another that bans discrimination on the basis of “pregnancy outcomes” prevailed in New York.
The results include firsts for the abortion landscape, which underwent a seismic shift in 2022 when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, a ruling that ended a nationwide right to abortion and cleared the way for bans to take effect in most Republican-controlled states.
They also came in the same election that Republican Donald Trump won the presidency. Among his inconsistent positions on abortion has been an insistence that it’s an issue best left to the states. Still, the president can have a major impact on abortion policy through executive action.
In the meantime, Missouri is positioned to be the first state where a vote will undo a ban on abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with an amendment that would allow lawmakers to restrict abortions only past the point of a fetus’ viability — usually considered after 21 weeks, although there’s no exact defined time frame.
But the ban, and other restrictive laws, are not automatically repealed. Advocates now have to ask courts to overturn laws to square with the new amendment.
“Today, Missourians made history and sent a clear message: decisions around pregnancy, including abortion, birth control, and miscarriage care are personal and private and should be left up to patients and their families, not politicians,” Rachel Sweet, campaign manager of Missourians for Constitutional Freedom, said in a statement.
Roughly half of Missouri’s voters said abortion should be legal in all or most cases, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 2,200 of the state’s voters. But only about 1 in 10 said abortion should be illegal in all cases; nearly 4 in 10 said abortion should be illegal in most cases.
Bans remain in place in three states after votes
Florida, Nebraska and South Dakota became the first states since Roe was overturned where abortion opponents prevailed on a ballot measure. Most voters supported the Florida measure, but it fell short of the required 60% to pass constitutional amendments in the state. Most states require a simple majority.
The result was a political win for Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican with a national profile, who had steered state GOP funds to the cause. His administration has weighed in, too, with a campaign against the measure, investigators questioning people who signed petitions to add it to the ballot and threats to TV stations that aired one commercial supporting it.
Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the national anti-abortion group SBA Pro-Life America, said in a statement that the result is “a momentous victory for life in Florida and for our entire country,” praising DeSantis for leading the charge against the measure.
The defeat makes permanent a shift in the Southern abortion landscape that began when the state’s six-week ban took effect in May. That removed Florida as a destination for abortion for many women from nearby states with deeper bans and also led to far more women from the state traveling to obtain abortion. The nearest states with looser restrictions are North Carolina and Virginia — hundreds of miles away.
“The reality is because of Florida’s constitution a minority of Florida voters have decided Amendment 4 will not be adopted,” said Lauren Brenzel, campaign director for the Yes on 4 Campaign said while wiping away tears. “The reality is a majority of Floridians just voted to end Florida’s abortion ban.”
In South Dakota, another state with a ban on abortion throughout pregnancy with some exceptions, the defeat of an abortion measure was more decisive. It would have allowed some regulations related to the health of the woman after 12 weeks. Because of that wrinkle, most national abortion-rights groups did not support it.
Voters in Nebraska adopted a measure that allows more abortion restrictions and enshrines the state’s current 12-week ban and rejected a competing measure that would have ensured abortion rights.
Other states guaranteed abortion rights
Arizona’s amendment will mean replacing the current law that bans abortion after the first 15 weeks of pregnancy. The new measure ensures abortion access until viability. A ballot measure there gained momentum after a state Supreme Court ruling in April found that the state could enforce a strict abortion ban adopted in 1864. Some GOP lawmakers joined with Democrats to repeal the law before it could be enforced.
In Maryland, the abortion rights amendment is a legal change that won’t make an immediate difference to abortion access in a state that already allows it.
It’s a similar situation in Montana, where abortion is already legal until viability.
The Colorado measure exceeded the 55% of support required to pass. Besides enshrining access, it also undoes an earlier amendment that barred using state and local government funding for abortion, opening the possibility of state Medicaid and government employee insurance plans covering care.
A New York equal rights law that abortion rights group say will bolster abortion rights also passed. It doesn’t contain the word “abortion” but rather bans discrimination on the basis of “pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy.” Sasha Ahuja, campaign director of New Yorkers for Equal Rights, called the result “a monumental victory for all New Yorkers” and a vote against opponents who she says used misleading parental rights and anti-trans messages to thwart the measure.
The results end a win streak for abortion-rights advocates
Until Tuesday, abortion rights advocates had prevailed on all seven measures that have appeared on statewide ballots since the fall of Roe.
The abortion rights campaigns have a big fundraising advantage this year. Their opponents’ efforts are focused on portraying the amendments as too extreme rather than abortion as immoral.
Currently, 13 states are enforcing bans at all stages of pregnancy, with some exceptions. Four more bar abortion in most cases after about six weeks of pregnancy — before women often realize they’re pregnant. Despite the bans, the number of monthly abortions in the U.S. has risen slightly, because of the growing use of abortion pills and organized efforts to help women travel for abortion. Still, advocates say the bans have reduced access, especially for lower-income and minority residents of the states with bans.
The issue is resonating with voters. About one-fourth said abortion policy was the single most important factor for their vote, according to AP VoteCast, a sweeping survey of more than 110,000 voters nationwide. Close to half said it was an important factor, but not the most important. Just over 1 in 10 said it was a minor factor.
The outcomes of ballot initiatives that sought to overturn strict abortion bans in Florida and Missouri were very important to a majority of voters in the states. More than half of Florida voters identified the result of the amendment as very important, while roughly 6 in 10 of Missouri’s voters said the same, the survey found.
___
Associated Press reporters Hannah Fingerhut and Amanda Seitz contributed to this article.
___
This article has been corrected to reflect in the ‘other states’ section that Montana, not Missouri, currently allows abortion until viability.
