Finally, the World Health Organization has sent investigators to Wuhan, China, ground zero for COVID-19, to begin the belated search for the origins of the coronavirus pandemic.
Today they will emerge from 14 days of quarantine. They should go straight to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where high-risk research, funded by US taxpayers, was being conducted into animal-to-human transmission of bat coronaviruses, a few miles from where the first COVID-19 cases were discovered.
Ontario is reporting 2,093 cases of #COVID19 and nearly 64,700 tests completed. Locally, there are 700 new cases in Toronto, 331 in Peel, 228 in York Region and 123 in Niagara.
As of 8:00 p.m. yesterday, 317,240 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered.
— Christine Elliott (@celliottability) January 28, 2021
German authorities recommend blocking use of AstraZeneca vaccine for over-65s
The independent commission advising the German government on vaccination policy has recommended that the AstraZeneca vaccine not be used for people aged over 65, in a move likely to complicate the acrimonious rollout of the jab in the EU.
A statement by the Standing Vaccine Commission at the Robert Koch Institute, Germany’s main public health agency, said there were “insufficient data currently available to ascertain how effective the vaccination is above 65 years”.
Oops… Completed Ontario vaccinations only half what was reported
COVID-19 scrutiny has stopped some women headed to Canada to give birth, documents allege
Greater scrutiny of travellers, prompted by COVID-19, has yielded new instances of women from other countries coming to Canada with what officials say is an unspoken plan to deliver their baby here, documents obtained by the Star show.
Some observers have repeatedly cautioned that the practice controversially dubbed “birth tourism” — which is legal — is being overblown and that focus on it has been driven as much by racism as real concern.
The federal government, meanwhile, has said it is studying the issue in an effort to understand the scope of what is happening.
Canada is so fecked up.
Weeks after the federal government ordered all travellers flying into Canada to provide a negative test before boarding, authorities continue to report flights into Montreal that carried passengers with COVID-19.
BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union’s dispute with AstraZeneca over vaccine supplies intensified Wednesday as the drugmaker defended itself against claims that it had reneged on contractual commitments and the two sides sparred over plans for further talks.
AstraZeneca Chief Executive Pascal Soriot addressed the dispute for the first time, rejecting the EU’s assertion that the company was failing to honor its commitments to deliver coronavirus vaccines. Soriot said delivery figures in AstraZeneca’s contract with the 27-nation bloc were targets, not firm commitments, and they couldn’t be met because of problems in rapidly expanding production capacity.
Ontario is reporting 1,670 cases of #COVID19 and nearly 55,200 tests completed. Locally, there are 450 new cases in Toronto, 342 in Peel, 171 in York Region and 128 in Niagara.
As of 8:00 p.m. yesterday, 305,330 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered.
— Christine Elliott (@celliottability) January 27, 2021
WARMINGTON: Why allow flights to land from COVID hotspots?
The big question is why?
When everybody is worrying about the U.K. variant of the coronavirus, why were there two flights from Heathrow landing at Pearson International on Tuesday? Why were passengers arriving from Pakistan, the Netherlands, India, Tanzania, China and Germany?
A prominent member of Ontario’s science table, which advises the government on pandemic restrictions including school closures, was paid by a teachers’ union for offering an argument against the government’s school reopening plans at a provincial labour board hearing, the Toronto Sun has learned.
The EU is poised to impose export controls on vaccines leaving the 27-member bloc to ensure supply on the continent. The proposal would require companies to seek approval before shipping vaccines to countries like Canada.
The riots are wrong and heartbreaking. But many people feel desperate in this lockdown.
We in the UK say we are turning a blind eye to something. In the Netherlands, they say, ‘we zullen het door de vingers zien’, which means, we’ll see it through the fingers. It is how the Dutch communicate that they are letting something slide.
Fueled by social media posts from Chinese officials, Chinese Catholics have been blamed for a recent apparent resurgence of COVID-19 cases near Beijing, a move that a local priest described as being like the times of “Emperor Nero.”
Remember this the next time some politician or corporate sleaze admonishes you about your “racism.”
Days after announcing deal, Ottawa learned China blocked CanSino’s vaccine shipment
The federal government found out that the Chinese government was interfering with Canada’s plan to test and possibly produce a COVID-19 vaccine made by a Chinese company just days after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the deal, according to newly released government documents.
The agreement between the Canadian government and CanSino Biologics Inc. would have made the latter the first company to conduct clinical trials for a COVID vaccine in Canada. It was also the first deal through which Canada could have secured a vaccine supply. It wasn’t until three months later — and after Trudeau announced additional vaccine deals with two other pharmaceutical companies — that his government conceded that its deal with CanSino was dead.
Yea, the first nation I’d hook up with to produce a vaccine is a murderous communist slave state that imprisons our citizens.
A group of Canadian scientists and health experts is starting a campaign to debunk misinformation about COVID-19.
The scientists involved are using the hashtag #ScienceUpFirst to provide information about the ongoing pandemic using science-based evidence on social media.
Cats and dogs may also need to be vaccinated against COVID-19 to help stunt the spread of the infectious disease — amid a threat of the “continued evolution of the virus in animals,” scientists have warned.
Clearly, by the number of riders on these buses, people are not following orders to stay home.
The people driving overflowing TTC buses don’t have the luxury of obeying the government order.
Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler blasted with pepper spray an unmasked man who confronted him and former Mayor Sam Adams with a video camera as the two left a pub Sunday night, the two men told police.
Wheeler and Adams had just finished dinner at the McMenamins Hillsdale Brewery & Public House on Southwest Sunset Boulevard around 8 p.m. when a man both described as middle-aged accused the current mayor of dining without a mask, according to a Portland Police Bureau report released Monday afternoon.
