“This government overreach is the direct result of Trudeau’s hateful demagoguery, targeting a minority to divide and distract from his own failures,” Conservative MP Pierre Poilievre said in a tweet on Thursday.
“China eats weird animals disease”
Trudeau plays dangerous game demanding U.S. truckers have shots
Canada plans to start turning away unvaccinated U.S. truckers at the border this weekend, a move that threatens to upend the flow of everything from food to auto parts to building supplies between two of the world’s largest trading partners.
Non-whites given preferential access to rare Covid treatment – lawsuit
Utah is facing legal action over its move to include race as a determining factor in treatment decisions
Health authorities in Utah and Minnesota have come under pressure after claims emerged that non-whites were given two extra points on a risk-based scorecard for deciding whether patients would receive Covid antibody treatment.
On Wednesday, Fox News reported that America First Legal, a conservative law group founded by former Donald Trump ally Stephen Miller, was threatening the states of Utah and Minnesota with legal action.
Rex Murphy: Trudeau Liberals no longer care about Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms
B.C., or Before COVID, if you were searching for pure rhapsody in political circles, then you had little to explore. Head to any high-toned Liberal gathering, one of their festal summits where the glories and landmarks of Liberal tenure were, almost liturgically, being celebrated, and inevitably some chosen hero of the Liberal moment would expatiate on the monumental achievements of 1982.
Over 900 unvaccinated members of CAF to face formal proceedings
The Department of National Defence says formal proceedings have been launched against more than 900 members of the Canadian Armed Forces for refusing to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
Chief of the defence staff Gen. Wayne Eyre ordered all military personnel to attest to having been fully vaccinated by mid-October. The deadline was later extended to mid-December.
The puzzle of America’s record Covid hospital rate
Even as the Omicron variant sweeps around the world, public health officials have noted that, in most cases, the number of Covid patients in hospitals remains significantly lower than during previous pandemic surges.
That’s not the case in the US, however, where the number of patients with the coronavirus currently in hospital has reached record numbers.
According to data from the Department of Health and Human Services, 145,982 people were in hospital with the virus on 11 January, surpassing a previous record set in January 2021.
Similarly, hospitals in large parts of neighbouring Canada have also seen surges, with Quebec reporting a pandemic high last weekend.
Search on for anti-vax dad accused of hiding 7-year-old daughter to keep her from being vaccinated
The search is on for a 7-year-old Canadian girl whose mom says the child’s father absconded with the child to keep her from being vaccinated against COVID-19.
Educational assistant Mariecar Jackson tells the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that her ex-husband, Michael Jackson, is keeping their unvaccinated daughter in an undisclosed location so she can’t be inoculated.
h/t Ayn Galt
Fauci Was Told Privately by Key Scientists That COVID-19 Natural Origin Was ‘Highly Unlikely,’ Newly Unredacted Emails Confirm
Top U.S. health officials, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, scrambled in early 2020 to respond to public reporting of a potential connection between COVID-19 and the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China.
This response, which included a secret Feb. 1, 2020, teleconference, was loosely detailed in previously released and heavily redacted emails. Those emails strongly suggested that Fauci and a small group of top scientists sought to promote the natural origin theory, despite having evidence and internal expert opinions that pointed to the possibility of a leak from the Wuhan lab.
Federal modelling suggests ‘very intense’ Omicron surge within weeks
New modelling released today by the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) suggests the highly transmissible Omicron variant will push hospital admissions to “extremely high levels” in the coming weeks as case counts reach levels never before seen in this country.
While there is a lot of uncertainty about how many new infections are being reported each day due to ongoing COVID-19 testing restraints, PHAC said the current test positivity rate suggests the variant is running rampant and there will be “several weeks of very intense activity expected to come.”
Nationally, the positivity rate is a stunning 28 per cent. That means more than one in four tests for the virus are coming back positive — nearly five times higher than the rate at any other point in the pandemic.
Novak Djokovic: Australia to detain tennis star on Saturday after visa cancelled
Novak Djokovic is set to be detained on Saturday after Australia cancelled his visa for a second time, in a row over his right to remain in the country unvaccinated.
The decision on “health and good order” grounds means he faces deportation and a three-year visa ban.
Djokovic’s lawyers called the decision “patently irrational” and will appeal.
The men’s tennis number one is still scheduled to play in the Australian Open in Melbourne on Monday.
Sink Me! Vancouverites pay vulnerable residents to get vaccine in their place; officials call it ‘abhorrent’
Health officials in Vancouver say they’re aware of cases of people trying to pay vulnerable people in the city’s Downtown Eastside to get vaccinated for them so they can fraudulently obtain a COVID-19 vaccine passport.
The Vancouver Coastal Health authority would not confirm how many cases were involved, but confirmed that at least a handful of reports people did obtain bogus BC Vaccine Cards through what it called “deplorable” behaviour.
Ontario has a big bunch of new Covid cases and Trudeau Gov Bungs Up Supply Chain Like Everything Else They Touch
Ontario reports 42 new COVID-19 deaths; hospitalizations set new record high
Ontario reported 42 new deaths due to COVID-19 on Friday, as hospitalizations continued to climb to pandemic-record highs.
The Ministry of Health says there are 3,814 people in hospital with COVID-19, up nearly 200 from 24 hours prior.
Individuals who are fully vaccinated represent 78.2% of Ontario’s total population and account for 185 of Ontario's 527 ICU admissions.
There are 10,964 new cases of #COVID19.
Today’s numbers will be available at 10:30 a.m. at https://t.co/ypmgZbVRvn.
— Christine Elliott (@celliottability) January 14, 2022
Every aspect of Canada’s supply chain will be impacted by vaccine mandate for truckers, experts warn
Industry experts are warning that the federal government’s new COVID-19 vaccine mandate for truckers will impact the country’s supply chain and hamper the flow of goods across the border, leading to potential shortages of some products.
Canadian Trucking Alliance (CTA) President Stephen Laskowski told CTV’s Your Morning that the new requirement “will definitely have a negative impact” on the supply chain, causing delays in goods reaching their destinations.
Mobile hospitals Ottawa spent $300-million on sit in storage while Omicron strains Canada’s health system
Ottawa allocated $300-million at the beginning of the pandemic for the construction of 15 mobile hospitals, but only four 100-bed units have been completed and they are sitting in storage despite the strain on hospitals caused by Omicron across the country.
The federal government gave a sole-sourced contract of up to $150-million to a joint venture between SNC-Lavalin and Pacific Architects and Engineers (SNC-PAE) in April, 2020, to build five mobile respiratory-care hospitals that can be set up in existing structures such as conference centres and indoor skating arenas.
A similar multimillion-dollar contract went to Weatherhaven Global Resources Ltd. for 10 stand-alone field hospitals that can be deployed either in urban or remote areas.
Go incognito.
Ontario first province to correct misinformation on COVID hospitalization numbers
Ontario is the first province in Canada to update its COVID-19 reporting system to better distinguish patients hospitalized because of the virus from those who tested positive for it after coming to hospital for other reasons.
Lack of clarity on vaccine rules at U.S. border leaves trucking industry idling
Canada’s trucking industry is stuck in neutral Thursday awaiting confirmation about a possible change to vaccination requirements at the U.S. border after a late-night statement from the government appeared to reverse course on the upcoming deadline.