Tag: vaccine

Posted on

Rheumatoid arthritis: Scientists investigate potential vaccine

Bottles of medicine in a factoryShare on Pinterest
The authors of a new examine hope that their function paves the way for a rheumatoid arthritis vaccine. James Porter/Getty Photos
  • Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune situation that triggers swelling, generally in the joints. It is continual and can be debilitating.
  • At this time, there is no treatment for RA.
  • A new analyze making use of an animal design implies that a vaccine to avert RA may possibly be doable.

RA is a debilitating continual problem that impacts the joints in the overall body. It can cause pain and decrease people’s skill to operate. Whilst men and women can take care of the problem, there is no heal.

A new analyze that appears in the Proceedings of the Nationwide Academy of Sciences stories that there could be hope for a vaccine to assistance avoid RA.

The study examined a specific protein and its impact on the improvement of arthritis in rats.

Arthritis refers to joint swelling. The phrase encompasses a broad class of disorders that affect the joints.

RA is an autoimmune illness, which usually means that the human body mistakenly assaults its individual tissues. This brings about irritation in the joints and joint hurt and can guide to serious soreness.

In accordance to the Arthritis Basis (AF), joint discomfort, inflammation, or stiffness normally lasts for 6 weeks or for a longer period. RA ordinarily has an effect on scaled-down joints in the entire body 1st, these as the bones of wrists and fingers, and the indications occur in the similar joints on both equally sides of the system.

Due to the fact there is no overcome, discomfort administration for men and women with arthritis is essential.

In a latest episode of the AF podcast “Live Certainly with Arthritis,” occupational therapist Rebecca Gillett defined that “pain is a personal encounter that is influenced by lots of components […] There is no 1-size-matches-all tactic when it comes to ache, but a person of the initial ways is figuring out unique difficulties and triggers.”

Presently, people today with RA deal with the issue by means of medications and other methods. For case in point, people today with arthritis are encouraged to stay active, reach or manage a moderate system bodyweight, and just take measures to shield their joints from injuries.

The authors of the modern examine concentrated on a precise protein — 14-3-3 zeta — and its function in arthritis.

They initially theorized that this protein contributes to the enhancement of arthritis. However, they found out that when they eradicated the protein in an animal design of RA, arthritis turned far more serious.

When speaking with Healthcare News These days, study creator Dr. Ritu Chakravarti stated that this protein functions as an antigen, which indicates that it triggers the immune system.

She explained: “[T]he second we noticed it was an antigen, we assumed that is a lousy detail. You usually have this bias that antigens are terrible.”

The researchers investigated the growth of arthritis in relation to 14-3-3 zeta in rats. They utilised genetically engineered rats, which do not develop 14-3-3 zeta, and induced arthritis in them.

When compared with rats that nevertheless created 14-3-3 zeta, those people that lacked the protein misplaced bone and body body weight and produced serious joint inflammation.

In the experimental rats, there have been three phases to the enhancement of arthritis: a period with no symptoms, a period of time with extreme irritation of the joints, and a period in which the inflammation commenced to lessen.

The researchers analyzed whether or not the infusion of antibodies to 14-3-3 zeta right after the onset of arthritis would assist with arthritis indicators. They observed that this remedy was ineffective.

Upcoming, they examined to see whether an immunization that contained 14-3-3 zeta would avoid signs and symptoms of arthritis. They immunized the rats 1 day immediately after the arthritis induction, all through the period with out signs. They also gave the rats a booster shot about 1 7 days immediately after inducing arthritis.

They observed that the vaccination with the 14-3-3 zeta protein decreased joint swelling and the severity of arthritis. It also served protect bone quality.

Dr. Chakravarti was enthusiastic by the study benefits, even though it was not what the staff experienced initially predicted to obtain. She explained to MNT:

“There is no get rid of for RA. And this is almost certainly one of the 1st research that exhibits that you can reduce RA.”

The review was performed in rats, and as a result researchers will want to have out considerably far more study. Even so, the examine is a major step toward much better treatment choices for these with RA.

Dr. Chakravarti recognized two big next actions in this investigation. For starters, “we need to see how this essentially will work in impacted persons. Can this vaccine basically reduce the disorder in people?”

The 2nd sizeable element will be understanding how this certain protein is influencing the symptoms and progress of arthritis.

Dr. Chakravarti told MNT that researchers will need to recognize “how it is doing the job. […] We really require to fully grasp it in more element, since once we know the mechanism of its motion, then we will know what other conditions we can use this for. Can we protect against various sclerosis, or can we prevent any other musculoskeletal conditions?”

Posted on

Covid News: New Study Finds Pfizer Vaccine Provides Strong Protection Against Hospitalization

ImageEmpty bottles of the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine last month at a clinic in Troy, Mich.
Credit…Emily Elconin for The New York Times

The Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine is 90 percent effective at preventing hospitalization for up to six months, with no signs of waning during that time period, according to a large new U.S. study conducted by researchers at Pfizer and Kaiser Permanente.

The vaccine also provides powerful protection against the highly contagious Delta variant, the scientists found. In a subset of people who had samples of their virus sequenced, the vaccine was 93 percent effective against hospitalization from Delta, compared with 95 percent against hospitalization from other variants.

“Protection against hospitalization remains high over time, even when Delta predominates,” said Sara Tartof, an epidemiologist at Kaiser Permanente Southern California and the first author of the study.

The vaccine’s effectiveness against infection did decline over time, however, falling from 88 percent during the first month after vaccination to 47 percent after five months.

The findings, published in The Lancet on Monday, come amid a debate over whether, and when, booster shots may be necessary. The Food and Drug Administration has authorized boosters for recipients of the Pfizer vaccine who are 65 or older or at high risk for infection or severe disease. And the Biden administration has pushed for boosters to be made more widely available to the general population.

But many scientists and public health experts have pushed back, arguing that the nation’s priority should be getting the shots to people who have not yet been vaccinated and that the vaccines still appear to provide good protection against the worst outcomes, including severe disease and death.

Data from Israel indicates that the Pfizer vaccine’s effectiveness against infection dropped to 39 percent in late June and early July, down from 95 percent in January through early April. But it remained more than 90 percent effective against severe disease during that time period.

On the other hand, a recent study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that the vaccine’s effectiveness against hospitalization dropped to 77 percent after four months, compared to 91 percent in the first few months.

In the new study, the researchers analyzed the electronic health records from more than 3.4 million members of Kaiser Permanente Southern California, between Dec. 14, 2020, and Aug. 8, 2021.

Overall, the vaccine was 90 percent effective against hospitalization and 73 percent effective against infection. Among those who were 65 or older, it was 86 percent effective against hospitalization and 61 percent effective against infection.

The researchers sequenced more than 5,000 samples of the virus. Overall, the Delta variant made up 28 percent of these samples, though it was the dominant variant in June and July.

The vaccine was slightly less effective against Delta than the other variants, providing 75 percent protection against infection with Delta, compared to 91 percent protection against the other variants.

But protection against infection declined at a similar rate over time, the researchers found. After four months, the effectiveness against infection had dropped to 53 percent against Delta and 67 percent against the other variants.

The findings could give fuel to both sides of the booster debate, Dr. Tartof said.

“The question is what do you want your booster program to do?” she said. Some may say this data supports boosters because it shows an increase in breakthrough infections over time, she said. Others, though, could point to the vaccine’s steady protection against severe disease and argue that boosters aren’t necessary.

Credit…Bryan Anselm for The New York Times

Johnson & Johnson is planning to ask U.S. regulators early this week to authorize a booster shot of its coronavirus vaccine, according to officials familiar with the company’s plans. The firm is the last of the three federally authorized vaccine providers to call for extra injections, amid mounting evidence that at least older adults and others in high-risk groups need more protection.

Federal officials have become increasingly worried that the more than 15 million Americans who received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine face too much risk of severe Covid-19. The Food and Drug Administration on Friday scheduled an Oct. 15 meeting of its expert advisory committee to discuss whether to grant emergency use authorization of a booster shot of the vaccine.

That is part of a broader effort by the government to shore up the protection provided by all three vaccines. Regulators last month authorized a booster shot for many recipients of Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine and are contemplating doing the same this month for recipients of Moderna’s.

The fact that the advisory committee meeting on Johnson & Johnson was scheduled even before the company filed an application to the Food and Drug Administration reflects a particular sense of urgency in the Biden administration to provide more protection to recipients of that vaccine.

Although the federal government has emphasized for months that all three vaccines are highly effective, a recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that Johnson & Johnson’s single-dose vaccine was only 71 percent effective against hospitalization from Covid, compared with 88 percent for Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine and 93 percent for Moderna’s.

“Real-world data suggest that the two-dose Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA vaccine regimens provide more protection” than the single dose of Johnson & Johnson, the researchers said. Other research found that Johnson & Johnson recipients were more likely to have breakthrough infections or symptomatic Covid than recipients of the other two vaccines.

Johnson & Johnson cites some studies with better results: A study of nearly two million people, funded by the company, estimated that the vaccine was 81 percent effective against hospitalization. Other research suggests that protection from Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine does not wane over time like protection from Pfizer-BioNTech’s vaccine.

Nonetheless, Johnson & Johnson now appears to agree with federal officials that a single shot of its vaccine is not enough.

Last month, the company announced that a second dose, given two months after the first, increased the vaccine’s effectiveness against symptomatic Covid by about 22 percentage points, to 94 percent. Johnson & Johnson also said two shots were 100 percent effective against severe disease, although that estimate was less conclusive.

Credit…Yana Paskova for The New York Times

Northwell Health, New York State’s largest health care provider, announced on Monday that 1,400 employees — less than 2 percent of its staff — refused to get vaccinated against the coronavirus and had to leave their jobs.

New York is requiring that the state’s more than 650,000 hospital and nursing home workers be vaccinated, a mandate that started to take effect last week, prompting tens of thousands of employees to get their shots. Others filed lawsuits, and courtrooms across the state are determining when and how to allow exemptions to the requirement.

New York’s health care mandate is particularly strict: Employees do not have the option for weekly testing or exemptions for religious reasons, though the latter is being challenged in the courts.

The Biden administration has made a vaccine requirement for many health care workers a central part of its effort to vaccinate the country, and many medical workers, particularly those at large hospital systems like Northwell, appear to be complying with vaccine mandates.

In New York state, 87 percent of hospital workers were completely inoculated as of Sept. 29, according to state health data.

The possibility of widespread staff shortages loomed before the mandate took effect, so much so that Gov. Kathy C. Hochul declared a state of emergency last week that would allow her to deploy National Guard troops, expedite visas for workers from abroad and recruit newly graduated or recently retired health care professionals to fill staffing shortages.

So far the number of workers in New York who have left their jobs is relatively small, and does not appear likely to result in the kind of staff shortages that could compromise patient care. Still, the governor’s contingency plans reflect the fears that New York hospitals could be imperiled in the same way that hospitals were in parts of the country that the Delta variant has devastated.

Northwell, which employs more than 76,000 people said in a statement that vaccinating all of its employees would allow the provider to “provide exceptional care at all of our hospitals, without interruption and enable all our facilities to remain open and fully operational.”

“Northwell has taken a rapid, aggressive approach to move successfully toward full vaccination compliance while maintaining continuity of care and ensuring that our high standard of patient safety is not compromised in any way,” the statement continued.

Some Northwell workers protested the vaccine mandates when they were first announced in August.

John Trinchino, a registered nurse, said he was fired last week from his job at Staten Island University Hospital, a Northwell facility. Mr. Trinchino said that he had Covid-19 earlier in the pandemic, and that he thought the antibodies from his infection would protect against further illness.

Mr. Trinchino added that requiring vaccination violated his civil liberties, and he did not plan on getting vaccinated.

“All this is going to lead to is worse care for the patients, and I’m just disgusted by it,” he said.

Joe Kemp, a spokesman for Northwell, said the company regretted losing any workers over vaccinations. He said a few thousand employees had gotten vaccinated as the deadline neared, and that some who initially lost their jobs had gotten shots and returned to work.

Terminated workers have the opportunity to interview for reinstatement for 30 days, Mr. Kemp said, but Northwell was “openly recruiting” for the newly vacant jobs.

“The goal was to get people vaccinated, not to get people terminated,” he said.

Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura contributed reporting.

Credit…Stacey Brimer/Oshner Health

Louisiana’s largest nonprofit health care provider is increasing its insurance fees next year for employees whose spouses or domestic partners are not vaccinated against Covid.

In a letter to its employees last month, the provider, Ochsner Health, said that it was adding the extra charge — about $200 a month — for unvaccinated spouses and domestic partners who covered by the company’s insurance plan.

The letter said the move was an effort to “protect our entire Ochsner team, which includes employees, their families and the communities we serve.”

About this data

Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The seven-day average is the average of a day and the previous six days of data. Currently hospitalized is the most recent number of patients with Covid-19 reported by hospitals in the state for the four days prior. Dips and spikes could be due to inconsistent reporting by hospitals. Hospitalization numbers early in the pandemic are undercounts due to incomplete reporting by hospitals to the federal government.

Warner Thomas, the company’s president and chief executive, said in a statement that spouses and domestic partners would be allowed to file for medical or religious exemptions to the policy.

“This is not a mandate,” he said, noting that the spouses and domestic partners could switch insurance plans to avoid the new fee.

“The reality is the cost of treating Covid-19, particularly for patients requiring intensive inpatient care, is expensive,” he added.

Mr. Thomas said that about 90 percent of the company’s Covid patients since December had been unvaccinated. According to a New York Times analysis in August, fully vaccinated people accounted for just 1 percent of Covid hospitalizations in Louisiana. The analysis looked at 40 states and the District of Columbia, and the rate in most of them was under 2 percent.

In August, Ochsner said that its employees must be vaccinated by the end of this month. Around 70 percent of its employees were inoculated at the time the mandate was announced.

The provider’s decision to charge extra was similar to a policy implemented by Delta Air Lines, which said in August that starting on Nov. 1, it would charge any employee who remains unvaccinated an additional $200 per month to remain on the company’s health care plan.

Delta became the first large U.S. employer to embrace an idea that has been widely discussed but is mired in legal uncertainty: charging unvaccinated employees more for health insurance.

Insurance surcharges may appeal to companies that are seeking a less coercive means to increase vaccination rates, said Wade Symons, a partner at Mercer, a benefits consulting firm.

New infections in Louisiana on Sunday were less than a fifth of the amount in August, when the state reached a pandemic high, according to a New York Times database. Hospitalizations are experiencing a similar trend.

The state authorities are still struggling to vaccinate people, however. Less than half of the state’s eligible population is fully vaccinated, according to a Times database, which is below the nationwide average of 56 percent.

Credit…Sarahbeth Maney/The New York Times

Mayor Brandon M. Scott of Baltimore tested positive for Covid-19 on Monday despite being vaccinated, his office said.

Mr. Scott, 37, was asymptomatic and self-isolating at his home in the city, Cal Harris, a spokesman for the mayor, said in a statement on Monday afternoon.

“This could have been a different situation if Mayor Scott were not vaccinated,” Mr. Harris said.

Mr. Harris added that city health officials were doing contact tracing on the colleagues that Mr. Scott interacted with at outdoor events last weekend.

About this data

Source: State and local health agencies. Daily cases are the number of new cases reported each day. The seven-day average is the average of a day and the previous six days of data.

A spokeswoman for the mayor said he attended two events on Saturday: the opening of a neighborhood center and a groundbreaking ceremony for a development company. On Sunday, he made an appearance at the city’s Parade of Latino Nations.

Zeke Cohen, a member of the Baltimore City Council, said on Twitter on Monday that he was with the mayor at the parade, but he later tested negative for the virus.

The mayor’s positive result came as Baltimore grapples with a significant rise in new infections. On Sunday, according to a New York Times database, the average number of daily new cases over the last seven days was 122.

During a plateau at the beginning of July, the daily average was 5 new cases per day. Slightly less than two-thirds of the city’s residents who are eligible for vaccinations are fully inoculated, according to a Times database.

Mr. Scott has been trying to improve the city’s vaccination rate. He said last month that all city workers must be inoculated by Oct. 18.

Credit…James Estrin/The New York Times

A second dose of the coronavirus vaccines made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna can nearly triple the chances of a rare heart condition in young men, according to a large new study published on Monday. But the absolute risk of the condition, called myocarditis, remains extremely low.

The study found 5.8 cases per million second doses in men, with an average age of 25 years. The risk after the first dose was much less, at 0.8 cases per million, not more than normally would be seen in that age group. The findings were published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine.

The results may be underestimates. The researchers tracked the medical status of vaccinated individuals for only a short time, and may have missed people whose heart problems were not severe enough to require hospitalization.

Concerns about myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle, have been the subject of intense discussion among advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and may have led the Food and Drug Administration to ask vaccine manufacturers to expand their clinical trials in younger children.

Experts have thus far said that the benefits of the vaccines far outweigh the rare risk of myocarditis. But citing the heart condition as a worry, regulators in some countries like Britain and Hong Kong have recommended a single dose of the vaccine for adolescents aged 12 to 15 years.

Other studies have also found that vaccination increases the risk of myocarditis. An Israeli study published in August looked at the electronic health records of about 2 million people and found an additional 2.7 cases of myocarditis for every 100,000 vaccinated people, compared with unvaccinated ones.

But the same research found that the risk of myocarditis from having Covid-19 was much higher, resulting in an extra 11 cases of the condition for every 100,000 infected people.

The C.D.C. has estimated that for every million vaccinated boys ages 12 to 17, the shots might cause a maximum of 70 myocarditis cases, but would prevent 5,700 infections, 215 hospitalizations and two deaths.

In the new study, researchers analyzed the medical records of 2.4 million members of the Kaiser Permanente Southern California health care system, aged 18 years or older. The participants had received at least one dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines between Dec. 14, 2020, and July 20, 2021.

The team identified individuals who were hospitalized within 10 days of receiving a vaccine dose and discharged with a diagnosis of myocarditis. The researchers found 15 cases of confirmed myocarditis in the vaccinated group, 13 of which were observed after the second dose.

None of those affected had a history of heart problems, and none were readmitted to the hospital after being discharged.

Credit…Hannah Mckay/Reuters

LONDON — Streamlined coronavirus restrictions on international travel in and out of England came into effect on Monday, including an easing of testing and quarantine requirements for fully vaccinated arrivals.

The change, which went into effect at 4 a.m. local time, replaced a three-tier traffic light-inspired system with a single “red” list of countries and territories that present the highest risk.

Critics had complained that the old system — which periodically involved the government altering the risk status of countries and which left Britons scrambling to figure out the latest rules during vacations — had caused confusion within the travel industry.

“We are accelerating towards a future where travel continues to reopen safely and remains open for good,” Grant Shapps, Britain’s transportation secretary, said in a statement, “and today’s rule changes are good news for families, businesses and the travel sector.” Mr. Shapps attributed the move to the vaccination rate; 67 percent of the population of the United Kingdom is fully vaccinated.

About this data

Source: Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University. The daily average is calculated with data that was reported in the last seven days.

Under the new rules, fully vaccinated travelers entering England will no longer be required to take a pre-departure coronavirus test when returning from a country that is not on the red list. And though travelers must still pay for a test to take on the second day after their return, beginning later this month, the government said it would accept less expensive rapid tests over polymerase chain reaction, or P.C.R., tests.

Arrivals who tested positive, however, would still need to isolate and take a P.C.R. test, “which would be genomically sequenced to help identify new variants,” the government said.

Testing and quarantine requirements for those who are not fully vaccinated remain the same, as do rules for those entering from “red” list countries.

After the success of a pilot test involving arrivals from United States and Europe, England will also begin a phased approach to recognizing vaccinations that have been administered in other countries and territories, expanding that list on Monday to over 50 countries including the United Arab Emirates, Japan and Canada.

In the past week, Britain reported an average of 33,779 daily cases and 112 daily deaths, according to a New York Times database. Cases have increased by 16 percent from the average two weeks ago.

Credit…Alvaro Barrientos/Associated Press

The European Medicines Agency, the European Union’s main drug regulator, said on Monday that a booster shot of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine could be given to healthy adults at least six months after the second dose.

The agency said data showed that antibody levels increased in people age 18 to 55 with normal immune systems who had received a third dose of the vaccine. It is still assessing booster shots of the Moderna vaccine.

The agency also said that people with “severely weakened” immune systems could receive an extra dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines as early as 28 days after a second dose. It is expected that an additional shot “would increase protection in at least some of the patients,” the agency said.

The recommendation is based on studies showing that an extra dose of those vaccines could increase the ability to produce antibodies in organ transplant recipients.

In the European Union, vaccination campaigns are a prerogative of national governments, and each of the 27 member nations can decide whether to give booster shots to all of their adult residents. Some E.U. nations, such as France, Germany and Belgium, started giving extra doses to older people and those with weakened immune systems last month, while the Czech Republic and Hungary opened this possibility to all adults.

Although the European Union has one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, with over 73 percent of adults fully inoculated, there is no coronavirus vaccine authorized yet for children. The European Center for Disease Prevention and Control warned last week that the average level of vaccination across the bloc is not sufficient to halt the virus from spreading if governments relax Covid-19 restrictions.

The agency said it was carefully monitoring “very rare” side effects of a booster shot, such as inflammatory heart conditions, but that for the moment the risk was not known.

The decisions of wealthier nations to administer booster shots while the rest of the world remains largely unvaccinated have raised alarm among health experts. Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the World Health Organization, has called for a moratorium on coronavirus vaccine booster shots for people who are not immunocompromised until at least the end of the year.

Credit…Andrew Testa for The New York Times

A deep sense of anxiety has crept through Britain as supply shortages afflict the nation — and threaten disruptions to the Christmas dinner table.

Slaughterhouses are understaffed and are processing a smaller-than-usual number of pigs. There is a shortage of drivers to move pork to grocery stores and butcher shops. And there are fewer butchers to prepare the meat for consumers.

If the problems persist, farmers like Simon Watchorn, who raises pigs about two hours northeast of London, may have to start culling. Pigs grow about 15 pounds each week, and after a certain point, they are too big for slaughterhouses to process.

Mr. Watchorn, 66, is one of many producers of food and other goods warning of a daunting winter ahead for Britons. Shortages continued to bedevil the British economy on Monday as gas stations in London and in southeastern England reported trouble getting fuel, and the government began deploying military personnel to help ease the lack of drivers. Supermarket consortiums say that pressures from rising transport costs, labor shortages and commodity costs are already pushing prices higher and will likely continue to do so.

Posted on

Today’s coronavirus news: Pfizer submits preliminary research on COVID-19 vaccine for kids aged five to 11; Ontario reports another 704 COVID-19 cases and seven more deaths

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

8:00 p.m.: Three Alaska hospitals have now instituted crisis protocols that would allow them to ration care if needed as the state recorded the worst COVID-19 diagnosis rates in the U.S. in recent days.

According to data collected by Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering, one person in every 84 in Alaska was diagnosed with COVID-19 from Sept. 22 to 29. The next highest rate was one in every 164 people in West Virginia.

Fairbanks Memorial Hospital activated the protocol Friday because of a critical shortage of bed capacity and staffing, along with the inability to transfer patients to other facilities. Two other Alaska hospitals, in Anchorage and Bethel, have invoked the same protocol.

Fairbanks Chief Medical Officer Dr. Angelique Ramirez said the decision to move to crisis standards was because of many factors, including community spread caused by the low vaccination rates and a high number of patients waiting to be admitted.

Statewide, 60{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} of eligible Alaskans are fully vaccinated. The Fairbanks North Star Borough is the third-worst region for vaccination rates in Alaska, with just under 52{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} of eligible residents vaccinated.

7:00 p.m.: Public Safety Canada says a contingent from the Canadian Armed Forces is expected to “be in position” Monday to decide where to deploy eight critical care nurses that will help Alberta combat the fourth wave of COVID-19.

The federal agency also says the Canadian Red Cross is planning to provide up to 20 medical professionals, some with intensive care unit experience, to augment or relieve existing staff working in Alberta’s hospitals.

Premier Jason Kenney announced Thursday that the province was finalizing a deal to secure eight to 10 intensive care ward specialists from the military, likely to be based in Edmonton, to help in hospitals.

He also said up to 20 trained Red Cross medical workers, some with intensive care experience, would be deployed in central Alberta.

Alberta is dealing with a COVID-19 crisis that has seen well over 1,000 new cases a day for weeks while filling intensive care wards to almost twice normal capacity.

The province’s health delivery agency has had to scramble and reassign staff to handle the surge of intensive care patients far above the normal capacity of 173 beds.

5:00 p.m.: New Brunswick is reporting a record-smashing 140 new COVID-19 infections and four deaths in a single day as the Maritime province continues to grapple with the the pandemic’s fourth wave.

Health officials say the deaths include a person aged 30 to 39 in the Fredericton region, a person aged 50 to 59 in the Edmundston region and two people aged 70 to 79 in the Fredericton and Moncton regions.

The four deaths bring the total number of COVID-19-related deaths in the province to 64.

Officials say among the 140 new cases, 94 are people who are unvaccinated, 34 are fully vaccinated and 12 are partially vaccinated.

New Brunswick currently has 44 people hospitalized due to the virus, with 17 in intensive care.

The province says 35 of the patients in hospital — or nearly 80 per cent — are unvaccinated while nine are either partially or fully vaccinated.

“Healthy younger people are getting sick as well as older individuals,” Premier Blaine Higgs said in a statement.

“Of the 140 cases announced, 88 are under 40. Those in that age bracket are less likely to end up in hospital but they still carry and can transmit the virus.”

In addition to the 140 new cases, the province reported 49 recoveries from COVID-19 on Saturday, bringing the number of active cases to 764.

The province said public safety officers will be conducting spot checks at churches this weekend, many of which have been the sites of recent COVID-19 exposures.

Officials said while the vast majority of churches have been following the rules, concerns remain that not all are and fines will be issued to institutions and individuals who break the mandatory public health rules.

“Four more New Brunswickers lost to the virus is a grim reminder of the continuing toll COVID-19 is taking on our communities and on people at every stage of life,” Dr. Jennifer Russell, the province’s chief medical officer of health, said in a statement.

While the number of hospitalizations remains manageable for now, the admissions place an extreme burden on the province’s health-care system, she said.

“We expected cases to climb and they may continue to do so for the next little while until we see the impact of the additional measures brought in last week.”

New Brunswick reimposed a state of emergency in late September to deal with the sudden spike in COVID-19 cases.

That followed a decision two months earlier to drop all of its COVID-19 restrictions — the first jurisdiction in Atlantic Canada to do so.

At the time, some infectious disease experts warned New Brunswick would face a surge in Delta-variant cases in the fall, mainly because of the decision to drop mask requirements in indoor public places.

The mask order has now been reinstated, along with a number of other health-protection measures. They include new rules to limit contacts, ensure physical distancing and require certain businesses and events to have vaccination or masking-and-testing policies.

3:45 p.m.: A one-day vaccine campaign, with more than 35 clinics across the City of Toronto, got underway on Saturday.

Mayor John Tory announced the launch of #Vax25, a COVID-19 inoculation push to promote vaccine clinics in the city’s 25 wards.

“I continue to urge eligible residents to get vaccinated now to help protect themselves and the progress we have made fighting this pandemic and reopening schools and businesses,” Tory said as he thanked city councillors for teaming up for the initiative.

#Vax25 features at least one clinic per ward supported and promoted by the ward’s councillor.

Read the full story here: Toronto launches one-day #Vax25 vaccine push throughout the city’s 25 wards

2:30 p.m.: Health Canada has received drugmaker Pfizer’s preliminary research on the effectiveness of its COVID-19 vaccine in children aged five to 11.

The drugmaker confirmed Saturday it provided the initial trial data to the federal department for review as it prepares to make a formal submission — possibly later this month — seeking authorization to use the product in children.

Pfizer Canada spokeswoman Christina Antoniou said the submission will be a request for full authorization.

She said the new drug submission process for COVID-19 vaccines offers the same flexibility as the interim order authorization pathway did, including allowing the company to submit a rolling submission.

“In other words, [it’s] not an emergency use authorization but a full approval under which we would continue to submit new data as it becomes available,” Antoniou said in an email.

Pfizer’s vaccine was initially given the green light for use in Canada last December. The two-shot vaccine, developed in partnership with German pharmaceutical company BioNTech, is currently available for those aged 12 and older.

Pfizer and BioNTech said last week that researchers found the vaccine antibody responses in children were just as strong as those found in teenagers and young adults getting regular-strength doses.

The companies submitted the research to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration last week and plan to request emergency use authorization of their vaccine in children ages five to 11 “in the coming weeks.”

Pediatric studies evaluating the safety and efficacy of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine in children aged six months to age five is ongoing, with initial results expected before the end of the year, Antoniou said.

12:15 p.m.: Quebec is reporting 640 additional cases of COVID-19 today and five more deaths due to the pandemic.

The vast majority of cases are due to the contagious Delta variant, which accounted for 86.9 per cent of infections sequenced between Sept. 12 and Sept. 18.

Overall hospitalizations declined by nine to 301, while the number of people in intensive care dropped by one to 83.

About 89 per cent of Quebec’s eligible population 12 and over have received one shot of vaccine, and 84 per cent have received two doses.

11:15 a.m.: Ontario is reporting another 704 COVID-19 cases and seven more deaths, according to its latest report released Saturday morning.

The province reports 401 COVID-19 cases were confirmed in unvaccinated people, 44 were partially vaccinated, and 198 cases in fully vaccinated people.

There are 274 people currently hospitalized with COVID-19 in the province, including 141 patients in intensive care testing positive for COVID-19. There are 110 people on ventilators. Locally, there are 150 cases in Toronto, 67 in Peel Region, 46 in York Region with 70 cases in Ottawa, 44 in Hamilton, 32 in Windsor and 32 in Niagara.

Ontario has administered 37,333 vaccine doses since its last daily update, with a total 21,847,046 vaccines given as of 8 p.m. Friday night.

According to the Star’s vaccine tracker, 11,263,479 people in Ontario have received at least one shot, or about 86.4 per cent of the eligible population 12 years and older. The province says 10,583,567 people have completed both vaccination shots, or approximately 81.2 per cent of the eligible population.

7:44 a.m.: Canadians overwhelmingly support the idea of requiring vaccine passports to gain admittance to public places such as restaurants, bars and gyms, a new poll suggests.

Fully 78 per cent of respondents to the Leger poll said they strongly support (56 per cent) or somewhat support (22 per cent) requiring proof of vaccination against COVID-19 to visit non-essential public places where numerous people typically congregate, including concert halls and festivals.

Just 13 per cent said they strongly oppose a proof-of-vaccination requirement, variations on which are being introduced by provincial governments across the country. Another nine per cent said they’re somewhat opposed.

Support ranged from a low of 70 per cent in the Atlantic Provinces to a high of 86 per cent in British Columbia. Eighty-one per cent of Alberta respondents also supported the move, although their province has been the most reluctant to adopt a vaccine passport system.

The poll of 1,537 Canadians was conducted Sept. 24-26, as health care systems in both Alberta and Saskatchewan were being overwhelmed by soaring cases of the Delta variant of the COVID-19 coronavirus.

The online poll cannot be assigned a margin of error as internet-based surveys are not considered random samples.

Seventy-four per cent of respondents said governments should not lift all public health restrictions now. Just 18 per cent supported lifting them.

Opposition to relaxing public health orders included 76 per cent of respondents in Alberta, where Premier Jason Kenney lifted most restrictions over the summer, only to have to reimpose some recently as the fourth wave of the pandemic swept the province.

Unsurprisingly given their provinces’ struggles with the fourth wave of the pandemic, Kenney and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe ranked the lowest among provincial first ministers for their handling of the health crisis.

Fully 80 per cent of Alberta respondents said they were very or somewhat dissatisfied with Kenney’s performance, and 74 per cent of Saskatchewan respondents felt the same about Moe.

By contrast, 74 per cent of Quebec respondents expressed satisfaction with Premier François Legault’s handling of the pandemic, 61 per cent of British Columbians were satisfied with Premier John Horgan and 52 per cent of Ontarians were satisfied with Premier Doug Ford’s performance.

Fifty-seven per cent nationally said they were satisfied with the federal government’s handling of the pandemic while 61 per cent expressed satisfaction with their municipal governments.

Respondents were split over the state of the pandemic in Canada, with 39 per cent saying they think the worst is over, 22 per cent saying we’re in the worst period of the crisis now and another 21 per cent saying the worst is yet to come. Nineteen per cent didn’t know.

7:43 a.m.: When Russians talk about the coronavirus over dinner or in hair salons, the conversation often turns to “antitela,” the Russian word for antibodies — the proteins produced by the body to fight infection.

Even President Vladimir Putin referred to them this week in a conversation with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, bragging about why he avoided infection even though dozens of people around him caught the coronavirus, including someone who spent a whole day with the Kremlin leader.

“I have high titres,” Putin said, referring to the measurement used to describe the concentration of antibodies in the blood. When Erdogan challenged him that the number Putin gave was low, the Russian insisted, “No, it’s a high level. There are different counting methods.”

But Western health experts say the antibody tests so popular in Russia are unreliable either for diagnosing COVID-19 or assessing immunity to it. The antibodies that these tests look for can only serve as evidence of a past infection, and scientists say it’s still unclear what level of antibodies indicates protection from the virus and for how long.

The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention says such tests should not be used to establish an active COVID-19 infection because it can take one to three weeks for the body to make antibodies. Health experts say tests that look for the virus’s genetic material, called PCR tests, or ones that look for virus proteins, called antigen tests, should be used to determine if someone is infected.

7:42 a.m.: It’s a milestone that by all accounts didn’t have to happen this soon.

The U.S. death toll from COVID-19 eclipsed 700,000 late Friday — a number greater than the population of Boston. The last 100,000 deaths occurred during a time when vaccines — which overwhelmingly prevent deaths, hospitalizations and serious illness — were available to any American over the age of 12.

The milestone is deeply frustrating to doctors, public health officials and the American public, who watched a pandemic that had been easing earlier in the summer take a dark turn. Tens of millions of Americans have refused to get vaccinated, allowing the highly contagious Delta variant to tear through the country and send the death toll from 600,000 to 700,000 in 3 1/2 months.

Saturday 7:42 a.m.: California will become the first U.S. state to require COVID-19 vaccinations for children to attend public and private schools in person in a mandate that could effect millions of students.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday announced that the coronavirus shot will be added to 10 other immunizations already required for school kids, including those for measles and mumps.

Exemptions would be granted for medical reasons or because of religious or personal beliefs but the exemption rules haven’t been written yet pending public comment.

Any student without an exemption who refuses to get the vaccine would be forced to do independent study at home.

“We want to end this pandemic. We are all exhausted by it,” Newsom said during a news conference at a San Francisco middle school after visiting with seventh graders.

“Vaccines work. It’s why California leads the country in preventing school closures and has the lowest case rates,” Newsom said.

Read Friday’s coronavirus news.

Posted on

Montana health officials: ‘The data are overwhelming. The COVID-19 vaccine offers the best protection against infection and at preventing severe illness’

&#13
&#13

By NewsDesk  @infectiousdiseasenews

The Department of Public Wellness and Human Solutions (DPHHS) launched a new report very last week with Montana-particular information from the past eight months that illustrates the best tool towards severe health issues from COVID-19 is to get vaccinated.

Impression by Alexandra_Koch from Pixabay

The report reviewed facts from February to September 2021, and identified that 89.5{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} of the scenarios, 88.6{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} of hospitalizations and 83.5{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} of the fatalities had been amid folks not fully vaccinated, including those not however eligible for vaccination.

The report also examined a recent 8-7 days period of time from July 11 to September 4, 2021, and found that between all instances noted in people suitable for vaccine, that Montanans who have been not entirely vaccinated contracted COVID-19 at a amount 4.4 instances increased than thoroughly vaccinated people. And, the COVID-19-linked hospitalization and demise prices were 5.1 and 3.3 instances greater, respectively, amongst not fully vaccinated individuals as as opposed with entirely vaccinated folks.

“The data are too much to handle. The COVID-19 vaccine delivers the greatest safety from an infection and at preventing severe health issues,” said DPHHS Director Adam Meier. “Clinical trials have found that the COVID-19 vaccines are safe and efficient at preventing extreme COVID-19-related results. If you have not gotten vaccinated and still have inquiries, I inspire all qualified Montanans to seek the advice of with their health care service provider or pharmacist.”

DPHHS community well being specialists also famous the influence of COVID-19 ailment on more youthful age teams. Adults aged 18-39 had the greatest amount of COVID-19 situations in contrast with other age groups between both of those the totally vaccinated and unvaccinated. Having said that, grownups in this age team who have been not totally vaccinated expert case fees 4.4 moments bigger than fully vaccinated persons in this age group.

DPHHS knowledge also present a notable age gap concerning vaccinated and unvaccinated men and women with severe COVID-19 relevant results, with intense results happening at younger ages amid people not absolutely vaccinated as opposed with completely vaccinated people. In a modern 8-7 days time period, the median age for COVID-19 hospitalizations was 60 a long time for not absolutely vaccinated and the median age amongst people thoroughly vaccinated was 75 years.

COVID-19 bacterial infections amongst totally vaccinated folks are called “breakthrough” cases. A breakthrough COVID-19 case is described as a COVID-19 infection which occurred 14 or far more days just after completing the major COVID-19 vaccine sequence. Depending on the distinct vaccine administered, completion of collection could be a single or two doses of vaccine.

It’s critical that all Montanans choose the essential safeguards to secure by themselves and their beloved ones.

“In addition to encouraging vaccination, DPHHS encourages all Montana residents and site visitors to training individual accountability and just take precautionary actions to gradual the distribute of the virus, which includes putting on a confront masking when correct, steering clear of massive crowds, remaining house when not sensation perfectly, and washing arms routinely,” said DPHHS acting State Medical Officer Dr. Maggie Cook dinner-Shimanek.

Posted on

Today’s coronavirus news: Ontario cracks down on businesses that flout vaccine certificate rules; Province reports 1,315 new COVID-19 cases over the past two days

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

7.06 p.m. The COVID-19 pandemic has made a bad situation worse for the homeless and housing resources in British Columbia’s capital, where shelter spaces are scarce for those who test positive for the virus, the province’s housing minister says, The Canadian Press reports.

David Eby said Friday he had hoped that once tent encampments were dismantled, the Crown agency BC Housing and provincial staff would be able to find more permanent solutions for the homeless, but a surge in COVID-19 cases hasn’t made that possible, according to CP.

“As the pandemic continues … we’re faced with a very real prospect, again, of not being able to provide supportive shelter for everyone who is COVID-positive and living in Victoria,” he said.

Many resources, such as non-profit organizations, were nearly overwhelmed as tent encampments around the region were dismantled and shelter spaces had to be found for those residents, he said.

“While this was a critical COVID response, and that response has helped ensure we don’t have COVID ripping through outdoor encampments across the city of Victoria today, it pushed many resources to the breaking point,” Eby said.

The province, along with the local health authority and city, announced the creation of 50 new COVID-19 isolation shelter spots to help those who have contracted the virus and want to live indoors.

The new spaces will be split between 30 spots in existing shelters and 20 in pop-up locations, Eby said. They will be temporary, and there are no plans to continue operating them after the pandemic.

Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps said the city has been working with the provincial government and Island Health to find a solution.

The city has been put in the difficult position of trying to keep parks open for the public as well as allowing homeless people to stay as they may be struggling with mental or other health conditions, she said.

“Sleeping in a tent in a park is neither a housing nor health solution,” Helps said.

3.09 p.m. British Columbia’s provincial health officer has mandated masks for all schoolchildren across the province after three school districts announced their own policies to include kindergarten-to-Grade 3 students, reports The Canadian Press.

Dr. Bonnie Henry says she has heard the concerns of parents as COVID-19 cases have risen over the last couple of weeks among kids, especially those between the ages of five and 11, and in communities with lower vaccination rates, according to CP.

Henry says her school mask mandate will be in place until at least January, when it will be assessed based on whether vaccines would be available for children under 12.

She says school staff who were prioritized for vaccination should be immunized, as well, to reduce the risk of COVID-19 entering schools at a time when more respiratory illnesses are circulating and so that families can gather for Thanksgiving.

School districts in Vancouver, Surrey and Burnaby had already announced that a provincial mask mandate for students in Grade 4 and up would be extended to younger kids, leaving 57 other school districts to either introduce policies independently or wait for Henry to impose a province-wide measure.

2:45 p.m. Following the suspension of a Kingston pub’s liquor licence, Ontario’s alcohol regulation agency says there will be “consequences” for businesses that do not comply with the province’s new vaccine certificate rules.

The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario suspended the sports pub’s liquor licence on Thursday after the Kingston Public Health Unit received complaints that J.A.K.K. Tuesdays was not asking customers for their proof-of-vaccination, a requirement of all indoor dining businesses.

J.A.K.K. Tuesdays is the first business to have its liquor licence revoked since the certificate rules went into effect last week, but it might not be the last.

In a statement to the Star, the AGCO said that businesses that do not comply with the regulation could face fines, temporary suspensions of their liquor licence, or — in the most extreme circumstances — a complete revocation of the licence.

Read the full story here from Jacob Lorinc

2 p.m. Alberta’s Opposition NDP is urging Premier Jason Kenney to make sure every member of his United Conservative caucus is vaccinated against COVID-19.

Thomas Dang, the NDP’s deputy house leader, says anyone who is not vaccinated should be removed from caucus.

Dang says with Alberta hospitals overcrowded with infected patients, it’s imperative that political leaders set the right example and get their shots.

Dang says all the NDP’s legislature members and staff have received both doses.

It’s not clear how many UCP members have been vaccinated, but there has been division in the caucus over health restrictions and vaccinations.

Kenney says the government is pursuing mandatory vaccinations or proof of negative tests for all house members, but adds there are constitutional issues that must be worked out.

2 p.m.: The surge in COVID-19 cases is continuing in Atlantic Canada, with Newfoundland and Labrador reporting 41 new cases and two more deaths attributed to the novel coronavirus since the province’s last update.

Officials said today the two new deaths involve a man in the central health region and a woman in the eastern health region who were both 70 years old or older.

The new cases include 31 in the central health region and 10 in the eastern region.

Newfoundland and Labrador has 180 active reported cases of COVID-19 and seven people in hospital with the disease, including four in critical care.

1:45 p.m. California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday announced the nation’s first coronavirus vaccination mandate for schoolchildren, a plan that will have all elementary through high school students get the shots once the vaccine gains final approval from the U.S. government for different age groups.

The government has fully approved the COVID-19 vaccine for those 16 and over but only granted an emergency authorization for anyone 12 to 15. Once federal regulators fully approve the vaccine for that group, the state will require students in seventh through 12th grades to get vaccinated in both public and private schools, Newsom’s office said.

The state will require the COVID-19 vaccine for students in kindergarten through sixth grade only after the federal government has given final approval for anyone 5 to 11.

The announcement comes as infections in most of California have dropped markedly in the last month. But Newsom has been emboldened after easily defeating a recall effort last month following a campaign where he emphasized his commitment to vaccine mandates to end the pandemic.

In Los Angeles County — the nation’s largest, with more than 10 million residents — just 1.7{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} of people tested for the virus have it and daily infections are down by half in the last month, when most kids went back to school.

“These numbers are amazingly low given that 3,000-plus schools are now open countywide,” county Health Director Barbara Ferrer said Thursday.

1:30 p.m. The Manitoba government is tightening COVID-19 public health orders, especially for people who are not fully vaccinated.

Starting Tuesday, a cap of 25 people will be placed on indoor events that include unvaccinated people, although there will be a one-week grace period for weddings and funerals.

People who allow unvaccinated people on their property will only be allowed 10 guests outdoors, while indoor gatherings will be restricted to one other household.

In the southern health region, where vaccination rates are low, retail businesses will be limited to half capacity.

Across the province, outdoor public gatherings will be capped at 50 people.

Chief public health officer, Dr. Brent Roussin, says most of the orders will not affect the majority of Manitobans because they are vaccinated.

The province already requires people to show proof of vaccination to attend a range of venues, including sporting events, concert halls and restaurants.

1:11 p.m. (updated) Ontario is reversing course and introducing a mandatory vaccination policy for staff at long-term-care homes.

The government’s previous policy was to require regular testing for those not vaccinated against COVID-19.

Long-Term Care Minister Rod Phillips announced today that all in-home staff, support workers, students and volunteers must be vaccinated by Nov. 15 unless they have a valid medical exemption.

He says any staff not fully vaccinated by then will not be able to enter a long-term-care home to work.

Phillips says vaccination rates of staff in many homes are not high enough in the face of the Delta variant.

Homes will also start randomly testing fully vaccinated staff, caregivers and visitors to try to detect breakthrough cases early.

1:06 p.m. The union representing flight attendants at Canada’s major airlines says reducing on-board food and drink service might help combat a rise in unruly passenger behaviour.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees says flight attendants are being subjected to verbal abuse from some passengers who don’t want to comply with the federal requirement to wear a mask on board.

The union says some passengers are taking their masks off to eat or drink and then leaving them off for longer than they should. It says this can lead to confrontations and also potentially exposes flight attendants to the virus.

Many airlines have restored most of their food and beverage service this summer after reducing service during the first stage of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But Transport Canada still recommends that airlines limit non-essential tasks, including in-flight service.

The union says Transport Canada should take a stricter stance. It says the regulator should reduce food and drink service on short-haul flights or set a limit on the amount of time a passenger can have their mask off to eat and drink.

12:15 p.m. Ontario is reporting another 668 COVID-19 cases and 11 more deaths. Of the 11, three of the deaths occurred more than one month ago and have been added due to a data cleanup, according to the province’s latest report released Friday morning.

Ontario is also reporting 647 COVID-19 cases for Thursday, as the data was not released on the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. Nine deaths were also reported on Thursday, five of which occurred more than one month ago and were added as part of a data cleanup.

Ontario has administered 29,704 vaccine doses since its last daily update, with 21,809,713 vaccines given in total as of 8 p.m., Thursday night. The total also includes 37,553 vaccine doses administered on Wednesday.

Read the full story from the Star’s Urbi Khan

11:30 a.m. Tokyo’s train stations were packed with commuters Friday as Japan fully came out of a coronavirus state of emergency for the first time in more than six months.

Emergency measures had been in place for more than half of the country, including Tokyo. Outgoing Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga thanked the people for their patience and co-operation. Cases are declining, but he asked them to stick to their basic anti-virus measures.

The emergency measures have mainly involved requests for eateries to curb alcohol and hours. They can now serve alcohol and operate an hour longer but still close at 9 p.m.

Daily reported cases fell below 1,600 this week nationwide after the mid-August peak of 25,000. Health experts attributed the declining numbers to vaccinations and increased social distancing after alarm from the near collapse of medical systems during the summer.

Nearly 59 per cent of Japanese people have been fully vaccinated. Japan has reported 1.6 million cases and 17,641 confirmed deaths.

11:15 a.m. Quebec’s legislature will soon only be accessible to people who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

The National Assembly announced the new health order targeting staff, visitors and politicians on Thursday evening, following a heated debate among the parties.

The governing Coalition Avenir Québec party as well as the Opposition Liberals voted in favour, arguing that elected officials should set an example for the rest of the population regarding vaccination.

Québec Solidaire and the Parti Québécois, the third and fourth parties in the legislature, opposed the measure because the public health department has not recommended it.

The vaccine passport requirement is expected to come into effect later in October.

The rule will require political personnel, legislature staff, journalists and visitors to show a piece of ID as well as proof they have been adequately vaccinated against COVID-19 in order to access the legislature.

11 a.m. A surge in demand has caused the Nova Scotia government to hit the pause button on Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) referrals, at least temporarily.

The province’s clinical lead for MAID, Dr. Gord Gubitz, said this week that Nova Scotia Health would put a 30-day hold on assisted-dying requests as the province works through a “significant backlog” caused by increased demand exacerbated by COVID-19 strains on the health-care system.

So far in 2021, referrals for MAID have already outstripped those from all of last year. In 2020, there were a total of 373 referrals; as of September of this year there were already 395 referrals.

“We know that recent changes in legislation made MAID an option for more people who were seeking it. We also know that with time grows awareness,” said Gubitz in an emailed statement.

Read the full story from the Star’s Steve McKinley

10:20 a.m. (updated) Ontario is reporting 1,315 cases of COVID-19 over the last two days and 12 more deaths.

The province says 668 cases of the virus and eight deaths were reported Friday, and 647 new cases and four deaths were reported on Thursday.

The Ministry of Health had not released updated data on Thursday because it was a federal holiday.

Health Minister Christine Elliott says that 502 of today’s new cases are in people who are not fully vaccinated or have an unknown vaccination status.

She says that 496 of Thursday’s cases were in unvaccinated people.

Elliot says 278 people are hospitalized because of COVID-19, with 163 people in intensive care because of the virus.

The ministry says that 86.3 per cent of Ontarians over the age of 12 have one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 81 per cent have two doses.

9:55 a.m. Justice Brett Kavanaugh tested positive for COVID-19 after taking a routine test Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court said. Kavanaugh, 56, who learned of the test results Thursday night, has no symptoms and has been fully vaccinated since January, the court said. His wife and daughters tested negative on Thursday.

The court said that “as a precaution,” Kavanaugh and his wife will not attend a formal investiture ceremony at the court Friday for the newest justice, Amy Coney Barrett.

The court is scheduled to begin its nine-month term on Monday, returning to the courtroom for arguments for the first time in a year and a half.

Kavanaugh is the first sitting justice known to have tested positive for COVID-19, although the Washington Post reported Barrett tested positive before she joined the court. All nine have been fully vaccinated.

9:25 a.m. India said Friday that British nationals arriving in the country will be subjected to COVID-19 tests and a 10-day mandatory quarantine, in response to the same measures imposed on Indians visiting the U.K.

India has been demanding that Britain revoke what it called a “discriminatory” advisory that includes Indians even if they are fully vaccinated with the Indian-made AstraZeneca shots.

India’s External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar had discussed the issue with British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss in a meeting in New York earlier this week.

India was irked that while the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine has been recognized by Britain, its version produced by Serum Institute of India has been excluded.

A foreign ministry official said that starting on Monday, all British arrivals, irrespective of their vaccination status, will have to undertake RT-PRC test within 72 hours before travel, another test on arrival in India and the third one eight days later.

8:21 a.m. The British Columbia ministries of health and education plan a joint news conference Friday to announce what are described as enhanced health and safety guidelines for B.C. schools.

A joint release from the ministries says provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry and Education Minister Jennifer Whiteside will make the announcement at 10:30 this morning.

It comes as school trustees in Vancouver, Surrey and Burnaby have moved beyond provincial regulations and tightened mask mandates in their districts to require face coverings for all students, regardless of grade level, in order to slow the spread of COVID-19.

B.C. currently requires masks for students in Grades 4 to 12 and Henry has resisted calls from parents and teachers to make face coverings mandatory in kindergarten to Grade 3.

She says masks are just one tool in containing COVID-19, while good ventilation and limits on intermingling between classes are other keys ways to curb the spread of the virus.

Members of a fourth Metro Vancouver school board meet later today to discuss a mask mandate for students in all grades in the New Westminster district, and to consider a recommendation to seek a legal opinion regarding mandatory vaccinations for staff members.

7:55 a.m. Pakistan banned unvaccinated adults from flights Friday as it tries to push vaccinations and avoid further lockdowns to contain the coronavirus.

Aviation Minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan announced the ban on Twitter, saying “only fully vaccinated passengers of age 18 years and above will be allowed to undertake domestic air travel within Pakistan.”

The government said last week unvaccinated people will not be allowed to work from offices and will not be eligible to enter shopping malls as of Friday. However, it was unclear how they would be stopped from entering such venues.

The bans don’t apply to children, who are not yet eligible for Pakistan’s vaccination campaign.

Nearly 30 million people are fully vaccinated in the country of 220 million. There is no shortage of vaccine, but many people have been hesitating, and the new measures are aimed at pushing them to get the shots.

Pakistan has reported 1.2 million COVID-19 cases and 27,785 deaths since the pandemic began last year.

7:40 a.m. Coronavirus deaths in Russia hit a record on Friday for the fourth straight day, and confirmed cases continued to surge as well.

Russia’s state coronavirus task force reported 887 deaths, the country’s highest daily number in the pandemic. The previous record, from a day earlier, stood at 867.

The task force also reported 24,522 new confirmed cases from Thursday — the highest daily tally since late July.

“The dynamic is bad. It elicits concern,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday.

The Russian government has no plans to impose a lockdown, according to Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova, the head of the task force.

Russia has had only one nationwide lockdown, at the beginning of the pandemic in the spring of 2020. The country’s authorities have shunned imposing tough restrictions ever since.

Peskov pointed out that many regional governments have their own infection-control measures, but he wouldn’t say whether the Kremlin considered those rules sufficient.

7:20 a.m. A fire at a hospital in the Romanian port city of Constanta killed at least nine COVID-19 patients, authorities said Friday.

All the victims were in the intensive care unit of Constanta’s Hospital for Infectious Diseases, said Constantin Amarandei, head of the city’s emergency inspectorate. Only one patient from the ICU survived.

The Health Ministry said in a statement that 113 patients were in the medical unit of the hospital and all the survivors have now been evacuated. The fire was extinguished by mid-morning but its cause is not yet known.

6:15 a.m.: Merck & Co. said Friday that its experimental COVID-19 pill reduced hospitalizations and deaths by half in people recently infected with the coronavirus and that it would soon ask health officials in the U.S. and around the world to authorize its use.

If cleared, Merck’s drug would be the first pill shown to treat COVID-19, a potentially major advance in efforts to fight the pandemic. All COVID-19 therapies now authorized in the U.S. require an IV or injection.

Merck and its partner Ridgeback Biotherapeutics said early results showed patients who received the drug, called molnupiravir, within five days of COVID-19 symptoms had about half the rate of hospitalization and death as patients who received a dummy pill. The study tracked 775 adults with mild-to-moderate COVID-19 who were considered higher risk for severe disease due to health problems such as obesity, diabetes or heart disease.

Among patients taking molnupiravir, 7.3{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} were either hospitalized or died at the end of 30 days, compared with 14.1{cfdf3f5372635aeb15fd3e2aecc7cb5d7150695e02bd72e0a44f1581164ad809} of those getting the dummy pill. There were no deaths in the drug group after that time period compared with eight deaths in the placebo group, according to Merck. The results were released by the company and have not been peer reviewed. Merck said it plans to present them at a future medical meeting.

6:05 a.m.: Japan fully came out of a coronavirus state of emergency for the first time in more than six months as the country starts to gradually ease virus measures to help rejuvenate the pandemic-hit economy as the infections slowed.

At Tokyo’s busy Shinagawa train station, a sea of mask-wearing commuters rushed to their work despite an approaching typhoon, with some returning to their offices after months of remote work.

The emergency measures, in place for more than half of the country including Tokyo, ended Thursday following a steady fall in new caseloads over the past few weeks, helping to ease pressure on Japanese health care systems.

Outgoing Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga thanked the people for their patience and co-operation, and asked them to stick to their basic anti-virus measures.

“Once again, I seek your co-operation so that we can return to our daily lives feeling safe,” he said.

5:45 a.m.: Toronto Public Health has declared a COVID-19 outbreak at Toronto East Detention Centre in Scarborough, according to a spokesperson from the Ministry of the Solicitor General.

Ontario is reporting 34 active COVID-19 cases among inmates at the correctional facility, as of Thursday.

According to provincial data, the detention centre reported four confirmed cases on Sept. 12. By Sept. 23, there were 17 active cases. An additional 17 confirmed infections were reported Monday.

Located near Eglinton Avenue East and Birchmount Road in Scarborough, the correctional facility has a capacity of 473 inmates.

Read more from the Star’s Joshua Chong.

5:30 a.m.: Somalia has opened the country’s first public oxygen plant as the Horn of Africa nation with one of the world’s weakest health systems combats COVID-19.

The oxygen plant was installed Thursday at a hospital in the capital, Mogadishu. It is expected to produce 1,000 cylinders of oxygen a week.

The scarcity of medical oxygen has hurt response efforts across many African nations as the Delta variant of the coronavirus now drives the bulk of infections on the continent of 1.3 billion people.

Insecurity in Somalia poses an added challenge to efforts to fight the pandemic. A COVID-19 ward recently set up at the hospital was partially destroyed weeks ago in an attack by the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group, which controls parts of Somalia and frequently targets the capital.

Part of the work around the oxygen plant’s installation focused on repairing that damage.

Somalia has one of the highest case fatality rates from COVID-19 in Africa, and few measures are enforced to slow the spread of the virus.

5:15 a.m.: Saskatchewan’s proof-of-vaccination policy is now in effect, meaning residents will have to show they have been immunized or have a negative COVID-19 test to access several businesses and event venues.

Public service employees are also required to provide proof of vaccination or provide a negative COVID-19 test result at least every seven days.

It comes a day after Saskatchewan recorded its highest daily case count of COVID-19 and its highest number of people needing intensive care.

Businesses that will be requiring proof of vaccination include restaurants, bars, nightclubs, theatres, casinos and entertainment venues.

Children under the age of 12 are exempt from the requirements.

5 a.m.: On Thursday, Alberta Premier Jason Kenney has announced about 35 out-of-province health-care staff will be brought in to help deal with the province’s growing COVID-19 crisis.

The move comes after the premier spent the week resisting calls from health-care professionals for a hard circuit-breaker lockdown in the province as well as playing down the immediate need for outside help.

But at a press conference on Thursday, Kenney said Alberta was working to bring in five or six workers from Newfoundland and Labrador, eight to 10 from the Canadian Armed Forces and about 20 from the Canadian Red Cross. The workers would likely head to Fort McMurray, Edmonton and Red Deer to assist with the province’s overwhelmed ICUs, Kenney said.

“It’s a helping hand,” said Kenney. “It will help to provide some relief. In some of our hospitals, that is very welcome.”

For weeks, Alberta has been grappling with the worst COVID-19 crisis in the country. About 200 additional ICU beds have been opened up while hospitals have struggled to keep up with the onslaught of mostly unvaccinated patients being admitted.

Read more from the Star’s Kieran Leavitt.

4:30 a.m.: A third school district in British Columbia has announced its own policy extending a provincial mask mandate for kindergarten-to-Grade 3 students starting Monday.

The Burnaby School District followed the lead of the Vancouver and Surrey districts in mandating masks for all grades as concerns mount about the rising number of COVID-19 infections among children who are not eligible for vaccination.

The district says in a letter sent to parents Thursday that the Burnaby Board of Education made a unanimous decision on the change after requesting an urgent meeting Wednesday night with Dr. Ariella Zbar, the medical health officer of Fraser Health.

“Her assurance that masks are an effective layer of protection for all students when used in concert with other health and safety measures informed the board’s decision to promptly implement this new mask requirement,” the letter says.