Today’s coronavirus news: More than 5M COVID-19 vaccine doses administered by Team Toronto - Toronto Star

The latest coronavirus news from Canada and around the world Tuesday. This file will be updated throughout the day. Web links to longer stories if available.

9:15 a.m. Russia said Tuesday that it will resume allowing air travel to Argentina, Bangladesh, Brazil, Costa Rica and Mongolia starting Dec. 1.

The government coronavirus task force said Russia will also lift the remaining restrictions on flights to Cuba, Mexico and Qatar, and increase the number of flights to Italy, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Vietnam as of Dec. 1. In all, Russia so far has resumed flights with over 60 countries.

The announcement comes as Russia’s daily coronavirus cases and COVID-19 deaths remain at record highs and less than 40 per cent of the country’s population of 146 million has been fully vaccinated. The task force on Tuesday reported 36,818 new confirmed cases and 1,240 deaths, the latter only one fewer than the record daily death toll.

9 a.m. Americans sharply boosted their spending last month, pushing up retail sales and giving the economy a lift. Much of the gain reflected the fact that shoppers are also paying higher prices.

Retail sales rose a seasonally adjusted 1.7 per cent in October from September, the U.S. Commerce Department said Tuesday. That's up from 0.8 per cent in the previous month.

Solid hiring, strong pay raises, and healthy savings for many households are underpinning robust spending. Americans are also still buying more cars, furniture, and other goods than they did before the pandemic, which is overwhelming U.S. ports and shipping firms and pushing up prices.

8:45 a.m. Mayor John Tory says Team Toronto has now administered more than 5 million COVID-19 vaccine doses.

Team Toronto reached the milestone late Monday. A total of 5,002,515 COVID-19 vaccine doses have now been administered in Toronto.

On Tuesday, the following mobile vaccination clinics are being held:

Main Square Community Centre – 12 p.m. to 4 p.m.

Rexdale Community Hub – 12:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.

Amesbury Park Library – 2 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Trinity Community Recreation Centre – 2 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Unison Health & Community Services – Jane Street 4:30 p.m. to 7 p.m.

8:30 a.m. Walking away from her nursing job after more than 25 years in the profession was difficult for Dorette Riggan.

“Just sad. Just really, really sad,” Riggan said.

But the Kitchener woman objected to being required to get the COVID-19 vaccine to keep working at St. Mary’s General Hospital and lost her job for not complying with the hospital’s mandatory immunization policy.

“I worked through the worst of it, but that didn’t matter. That’s the frustrating part,” Riggan said. “But unless you take the vaccine now, you can’t work.”

8 a.m. Staff on GO Transit and UP Express trains have been allowed to stay on the job without getting their COVID-19 shots, despite the provincial transit agency’s introduction of a vaccine mandate two weeks ago, the Star has learned.

Metrolinx, the Crown corporation that oversees GO bus and rail lines as well as the airport train service, announced Aug. 20 it would require all staff to get vaccinated against COVID-19. The policy, which was instituted under the direction of Transportation Minister Caroline Mulroney, went into effect Nov. 1 and is supposed to apply to employees, contractors and anyone working on Metrolinx property.

But while Metrolinx has suspended GO bus employees who didn’t get their shots by the deadline, the Star has learned the mandate is not yet in force for the hundreds of employees who operate GO and UP trains.

Read the full story from the Star’s Ben Spurr

7:35 a.m. Alaska doctors plan to ask the State Medical Board to investigate concerns about the spread of misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines and treatments by other physicians.

Merijeanne Moore, a private practice psychiatrist, said she drafted the letter out of concern over an event about COVID-19 treatments that featured prominent vaccine skeptics in Anchorage last month, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

Moore said Saturday that nearly 100 doctors had signed the letter and more could before she plans to submit the letter on Tuesday.

“We are writing out of concern that medical misinformation about the COVID-19 vaccine and treatment is being spread in Alaska, including by physicians,” the letter stated.

7:31 a.m. When the pack of Excel arrived in the mail, it dawned on me: I hadn’t chewed gum in nearly two years.

The pandemic created winners and losers in the candy aisle. Chips, ice cream and cookies were popular treats in a stay-at-home world, but minty freshness didn’t have the same cachet. At home, a toothbrush was always a few steps away. In a virtual meeting, coffee breath wasn’t a problem. In public, masks kept your egg salad sandwich a secret.

Before the pandemic, gum was a $359-million-a-year (U.S.) industry in Canada. In 2020 sales fell to $293 million, a decline of 18 per cent, according to market research firm Euromonitor International. Since half of all gum chewing happens outside the home, a world with limited social interaction presented a significant disruption to the industry.

Read the full story from the Star’s Katie Daubs

7:27 a.m. Health workers in Belgium who don't want to get vaccinated against COVID-19 will face losing their jobs.

Amid a surge of new coronavirus cases that has led hospitals to reserve half of their ICU beds for COVID-19 patients, Belgium's federal government finalized a draft bill late on Monday to make vaccination of health care workers mandatory.

Starting Jan 1, they will have a three-month window to get their shots. During that period, those who remain unvaccinated will be notified of a suspension of their contract unless they can provide a certificate of recovery from COVID-19 or negative tests on a regular basis, and will be temporarily unemployed. From April, workers without a proper justification for their refusal could be dismissed.

According to various estimates, some 60,000 health workers across the country of 11.5 million country are not vaccinated against COVID-19.

7:15 a.m. Pfizer announced a deal Tuesday to allow its promising COVID-19 treatment to be made and sold inexpensively in 95 poorer nations that are home to more than half of the world’s population.

The agreement follows a similar arrangement negotiated by Merck last month, and together the deals have the potential to vastly expand global production of two simple antiviral pills that could alter the course of the pandemic by preventing severe illness from the coronavirus.

“The fact that we now have two manufacturer-anywhere licenses for these two drugs is a big change, and it draws a big contrast with the restrictive licensing so far for vaccines,” said James Love, who leads Knowledge Ecology International, a nonprofit that researches access to medical products.

Under the agreement, Pfizer will grant a royalty-free license for the pill to the Medicines Patent Pool, a nonprofit backed by the United Nations, in a deal that will allow manufacturers to take out a sublicense. They will receive Pfizer’s formula for the drug and be able to sell it for use in 95 developing countries, mostly in Africa and Asia, once regulators authorize the drug in those places. The organization reached a similar deal with Merck for its COVID antiviral pill, molnupiravir, to be made and sold inexpensively in 105 poorer countries.

Tuesday 5:42 a.m.: Whether it’s the moviegoer who ditches their mask at the start of the show to eat popcorn and never puts it on again, or the commuter on the subway who sports theirs just below the nose, mask use in Ontario seems to be slipping, literally.

But with COVID-19 cases ticking up again with the cold weather, a reopened economy, and vaccination rates plateauing, Canada’s chief public health officer is urging people to double down on masking as a tool to help stop airborne transmission.

In a series of tweets over the weekend, Dr. Theresa Tam stressed that the virus can linger in the air we breathe, much like second-hand smoke, and a well-fitting mask is vital to protect yourself when spending time in indoor public spaces, particularly in the absence of good ventilation.

There has been a paradigm shift in the thinking behind mask use, to the current emphasis on protecting oneself as opposed to the initial consideration of keeping others safe from what we might be exhaling, said Colin Furness, an infection control epidemiologist at the University of Toronto.

Read more on the story, The battle against airborne COVID has shifted. Why your mask is the last layer of defence, by Kenyon Wallace and May Warren.

Read Monday’s coronavirus news.

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2021-11-16 13:52:30Z
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