Today’s coronavirus news: Ontario reports first case of a rare blood clot in a man in his 60s who received AstraZenenca vaccine; Ontario reports 4,505 cases of COVID;
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.
10:27 a.m. (updated) Ontario is reporting its first case of a rare blood clot in a person who received the Oxford-AstraZenenca COVID-19 vaccine.
The province's top doctor says the patient is a man in his 60s who had received his first dose.
Dr. David Williams says the man has been treated and is recovering at home.
Ontario says it's the fourth case of the rare clotting condition in Canada out of more than 1.1 million AstraZeneca doses administered across the country.
The province says it's monitoring the situation.
It will continue offering the vaccine to people aged 40 and older.
More coming.
10:18 a.m. (updated) Ontario is reporting 4,505 COVID-19 cases with 34 deaths. The seven-day average is down to 4,132 cases per day or 199 weekly per 100,000, and up to 28.4 deaths per day, a third wave high. Labs report 56,206 completed tests and 8.8 per cent positivity.
Locally, there are 1,257 new cases in Toronto, 1,232 in Peel, 412 in York Region, 247 in Ottawa and 224 in Durham.
As of 8 p.m. Thursday, 4,400,674 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered.
10:15 a.m. Ontario is confirming its first case of VITT - a rare and serious blood clotting disorder - linked to the AstraZeneca vaccine.
10 a.m. Parking tickets in Mississauga's waterfront areas will pack a bigger punch starting in May after city council approved increases to fines near Lake Ontario.
Council approved the creation of the Lakefront Increased Penalty Zone April 21, hiking $30 and $55 parking tickets to $100 for areas south of Lakeshore Road.
The increased fines, which will be in effect May 1 to Sept. 30, aim to curb traffic congestion and illegal parking in the waterfront area as many have sought to flock to lakefront parks recently as a COVID-friendly outing.
Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie said she appreciates the need to get outside during the pandemic, but that an increase in parking fees for the area was "quite overdue."
"We do have to put a value on that real estate," she said, adding that money from the fees could help address a parking spot deficit in the future.
Deborah Goss, president of Lakeview Ratepayers Association, said the last two years have had the highest volumes of vehicular and pedestrian traffic around the lake that she remembers in three decades of living in the area.
8:50 a.m. India set another global record in daily infections for a second straight day with 332,730 cases.
The situation was worsening by the day with hospitals taking to social media pleading with the government to replenish their oxygen supplies and threatening to stop new admissions of patients. India has recorded 2,263 deaths in the past 24 hours for a confirmed total of 186,920.
The government is putting oxygen tankers on special express trains to help save COVID-19 patients who are struggling to breathe. More than a dozen people died when an oxygen-fed fire ripped through a coronavirus ward in a populous western state.
India, a country of nearly 1.4 billion people, has confirmed 16 million coronavirus cases. That's second only to the United States.
8:48 a.m. (updated) Pregnant women of any age in Ontario are now eligible to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.
The province says the change is in light of new information showing women who are pregnant are at high risk of severe illness.
The health minister's office says pregnant women are now considered among those with highest need for shots.
They can now book through the provincial call centre - at 1-888-999-6488 - or through local public health units.
A doctor's note is not necessary, and women can expect to wait about 16 weeks for a second dose.
8:46 a.m. The European Medicines Agency is expected to provide updated guidance Friday on how countries across Europe should use the coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca.
Earlier this month, the Amsterdam-based drug regulator for the 27-nation European Union said there was a possible link" between the AstraZeneca vaccine and rare blood clotting disorders, but that the benefits of getting the shots outweighed the risks.
The agency's experts have since been considering related issues, including whether people who received a first AstraZeneca dose should be offered a second shot, and if there are specific risk factors that might make some people more vulnerable to developing the unusual blood clots.
The EMA previously described the clots as very rare" side effects and said the vaccine label's should be modified so doctors and patients are aware.
It's still unclear how frequently the rare blood clots occur. According to data from the U.K., which has administered more AZ vaccine than any other country, there were 30 such cases among 18 million doses, as of late March.
Last month, more than a dozen countries, mostly in Europe, suspended their use of the AstraZeneca vaccine over the blood clot issue. Most restarted - some with age restrictions - after the EMA said countries should continue using the vaccine.
7:55 a.m. As of Friday, there are 813 patients with COVID-related critical illness now in Ontario adult and pediatric ICUs with 70 new admissions.
7:41 a.m. What will or won't you do without access to outdoor spaces?
The provincial government has ordered several outdoor amenities closed in its latest attempt to curb the spread of COVID-19 in Ontario. While Ford reversed the decision to shut playgrounds, outdoor sports facilities like golf courses, tennis courts, soccer fields and picnic tables remain shut. Health experts say it's a bad move.
Complete the sentence: Without outdoor recreation, I will ___
7:15 a.m. The early bird gets the vaccine - maybe.
That was the sad experience for Scarborough residents who woke up early Thursday and headed to pop-up clinics set up for their postal codes, identified as COVID-19 hot spots.
At Woburn Collegiate Institute on Ellesmere Road, residents of the M1G area waited in long lineups only to receive an appointment card and told to come back much later in the day for the jab. And in the southwest part of Scarborough, hundreds of M1L residents lined up at Warden Woods Community Centre only to be told to leave and not come back as the clinic had just 500 doses available.
It was another day in what many have started to refer to as the Hunger Games" of getting vaccinated in a COVID-19 hot spot.
Suzette Ho, who heard about the Warden Woods pop-up clinic through a neighbourhood Facebook group, arrived at 7 a.m. with her husband. Hundreds of people were already in line.
Read the full story from the Star's Danica Samuel
7:05 a.m. Japan declared a third state of emergency for Tokyo and three western prefectures on Friday amid skepticism it will be enough to curb a rapid coronavirus resurgence just three months ahead of the Olympics.
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga announced the emergency for Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto and Hyogo from April 25 through May 11.
The step is largely intended to be short and intensive" to stop people from travelling and spreading the virus during Japan's Golden Week" holidays from late April through the first week of May, Suga said. He is due to explain the measures at a news conference later Friday as he seeks the public's understanding.
Japan's third state of emergency since the pandemic began comes only a month after an earlier emergency ended in the Tokyo area. For days, experts and local leaders said ongoing semi-emergency measures have failed and tougher steps are urgently needed.
Past emergency measures, issued a year ago and then in January, were toothless and authorized only non-mandatory requests. The government in February toughened a law on anti-virus measures to allow authorities to issue binding orders for nonessential businesses to shorten their hours or close, in exchange for compensation for those who comply and penalties for violators.
The measures this time are to include shutdown orders for bars, department stores, malls, theme parks, theatres and museums. Restaurants that do not serve alcohol and public transportation services are asked to close early. Schools will stay open, but universities are asked to return to online classes.
7 a.m. Sabina Vohra-Miller wants to cry every time she thinks of the COVID-19 surge that's devastating India - and fears Canada could face a similar scenario.
The unfairness. It's heartbreaking to see what's happening in India right now," said Vohra-Miller, who co-founded the South Asian Health Network in Toronto and has a master's degree in pharmacology.
And (to see) the parallels with what is happening here in Canada."
India's COVID-19 cases are out of control, rising by more than 300,000 in a single day this week. It's partly due to the B.1.617 variant, sometimes called the double mutant" variant, which was first detected in India and recently popped up in Quebec, Alberta and B.C.
Canada Thursday banned flights from India and Pakistan for 30 days, partly to contain the variant's spread.
Vohra-Miller thinks if vaccines had been distributed more evenly worldwide, India's tragic situation could have been avoided. Only about 10 per cent of its population has been vaccinated. It reminds her of how communities in Toronto with higher proportions of racialized Canadians have also been vaccinated more slowly.
Read the full story from the Star's Alex McKeen
6:35 a.m. Thailand's health authorities announced Friday they have confirmed 2,070 new COVID-19 cases, a new daily record that brings the country's total to 50,183.
The rising numbers are severely straining the supply of hospital beds and ICU capacity.
The record number of new infections came a day after a new daily high of seven deaths was announced. Four more deaths were announced Friday, bringing Thailand's total to 121.
At the beginning of March, Thailand had 26,031 cases with double-digit daily increases, but a new outbreak sent the numbers skyrocketing.
Taweesilp Visanuyothin, a spokesman for the Center for COVID-19 Situation Administration, said Bangkok, with the highest number of cases, has only 69 empty ICU beds left out of a total of more than 400. He said that is enough for the next six to eight days according to the projected demand of 10-13 additional ICU beds per day. Nationwide demand, forecast at 52 ICU beds per day, would use up the capacity in 19 days, he said.
Under Thai law, infected patients must be held in hospital facilities, but even with the addition of field hospitals there are not enough beds. There are 19,873 people in hospitals and field facilities nationwide, but in some areas that are short of beds, infected people are isolating at home.
6:21 a.m. (updated) Toronto surpassed more than a million COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the city. Mayor John Tory says more than 26,000 were given Thursday for a total of 1,004,339.
6:06 a.m. Painted rings on the grass at Trinity Bellwoods Park to encourage physical distancing - a much-mocked feature of Toronto's early pandemic response - are coming back.
A city news release states the rings will soon appear, as they first did in spring 2020, despite the current provincial stay-at-home order and pleas from public health officials to avoid mixing households to halt surging COVID-19 infections.
Installation work will begin next week depending on weather conditions - the paint requires dry, sunny weather to cure properly...," the release states.
While there is currently a province-wide stay-at-home order in effect, the city recognizes that many residents living in apartment buildings and condominiums who do not have yards need spaces to get exercise and fresh air in City parks.
Trinity Bellwoods Park is a popular location for many downtown residents and the painted physical distancing circles will help keep people safe while using the park."
Read the full story from the Star's David Rider
6:05 a.m. Under pressure to stem the rise of coronavirus variants, the Canadian government banned all direct passenger flights from India and Pakistan for 30 days as COVID-19 makes a deadly resurgence in that region.
Ottawa is also imposing new restrictions on travellers transiting through other countries, requiring negative COVID-19 tests from the last country passengers land in before coming to Canada.
But it is not banning cargo flights and Ottawa is still hoping that India, which has suspended vaccine exports, will send the bulk of 1.5 million AstraZeneca doses Canada had purchased through the Serum Institute of India.
Those doses - about 1 million - are now in limbo, at least until June due to export controls in India, officials admitted Thursday.
The flight bans were to take effect just before midnight Thursday. Non-essential travel has been discouraged for more than a year, but Canadian citizens have a constitutional right to return to this country from anywhere in the world. The flight bans will curb re-entries for at least four weeks from those two Southeast Asian countries.
Read the full story from the Star's Tonda MacCharles and Alex Boutilier
6 a.m. A provincial order closing outdoor amenities for tennis, golf, basketball, skateboarding and more should be revisited, Mississauga and Toronto officials say.
While the order runs counter to advice from Premier Doug Ford's own COVID-19 scientific advisers, officials aren't hopeful for what would be the latest in a series of Ford reversals on ways to tame runaway COVID-19 infections.
Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie has received no response to her plea that badly need exercise options for kids and families be allowed to remain open, with rules and in some cases supervision, to minimize the risk of virus transmission.
I can only assume that (Ford) believes that any other reopenings at this time would send the wrong signal as we are in a very heated third wave of the pandemic," Crombie told the Star on Thursday.
In a statement Mayor John Tory told the Star: I would support any reconsideration of the limits on outdoor activity that is based on scientific advice received. Any change to current restrictions would have to be accompanied by careful compliance with public health rules (masks, distance, etc)."
Read the full story from the Star's David Rider
5:40 a.m. Some Ontarians who thought they were next in line for a jab of the COVID-19 vaccine, because their neighbourhoods were identified by the province as vaccination hot spots, are discovering they might have to wait longer.
When Doug Ford's provincial government announced a new strategy to target vaccines in 114 high-risk areas two weeks ago, it pledged that everyone 18 and over would be eligible in those neighbourhoods.
But as local health units grapple with neighbourhood flare-ups amid vaccine shortages, they are being forced to prioritize the hottest of the hot spots. And that means some areas on the government's original list of vaccination priorities will take a back seat temporarily.
Are you going to put droplets of water on every neighbourhood, or are you going to target the hose on the highest flame?" asked Joe Cressy, chair of the Toronto Board of Health and a downtown city councillor. Let's blitz the neighbourhoods hardest hit so that we can do them, protect them, and move on to the next."
Toronto officials announced a sprint strategy" Wednesday to focus on ramping up vaccinations in the 13 highest-risk forward sortation areas (the first three characters in postal codes) in the northwest, Scarborough and Thorncliffe Park, prioritizing them over the 53 areas on the original provincial list.
Read the full story from the Star's Kenyon Wallace and May Warren
5:35 a.m. We've been seeing regular outbursts of rage and frustration during the pandemic. You might be feeling it too. This last week was full of frustrating health news and new restrictions that are a flashpoint across social media. There are a lot of factors right now that contribute to us feeling more frustration and expressing this more readily toward others.
We will round up your responses and put them together to show you that you're not alone.
After 13 exhausting COVID-filled months, how are you feeling?
5:32 a.m. In an alarming new trend, people are dying at home from COVID-19 as the third wave of the pandemic increasingly fills hospitals with patients who are younger and sicker.
Ontario's chief coroner says an average of two people a day have been succumbing to the disease at their houses or apartments in the last two weeks because symptoms can progress quickly with more contagious and dangerous variants.
That is in excess of anything that we saw during wave one and over wave two as well," Dr. Dirk Huyer told a news conference Thursday as the province reported 40 more COVID-19 deaths, the highest daily toll in two months.
People dying at home have ranged in age from their 30s to the 70s in a development that Huyer described as new, unfortunate and sad."
While officials in his office are delving deeper into reports on the deaths to discern more layers of detail, Huyer said he went public with the trend to alert people to be on their guard even as hospitals and their intensive care units are facing unprecedented pressures.
Most of the people who died at home had tested positive for COVID-19 or have been associated with people who have, and were found deceased by family members or housemates later in the day or the next morning.
These were people that weren't necessarily appearing, based upon their symptoms, to be needing to go to hospital or an ambulance to be called. So it's not that people were ignoring symptoms from what I've read ... these were people who did have stable conditions and then deteriorated very quickly," Huyer said.
Read the full story from the Star's Rob Ferguson
5:27 a.m. When Adam Romano heard he was eligible to get the COVID-19 vaccine in early April, he did what most people in the 21st century would do: he rushed to the internet to find out all the details.
But Romano, who lives in a high-risk downtown Toronto postal code, quickly discovered that details were vague. The province's website wasn't very helpful and had limited information on where and when he could get a vaccine. When he finally located the vaccination clinics nearby, another hurdle emerged - finding an open slot for an appointment.
It was kind of, everybody figure it out for yourselves,'" the 35-year-old said.
After searching his postal code on Twitter incessantly for weeks, Romano finally stumbled on an account aptly named @to_vaccine. It was a bot, with only 10 followers at the time, that promised to update people periodically on when vaccine appointments became available in his area.
A week later, Romano finally secured an appointment at a nearby community clinic, all thanks to the bot account.
Read the full story from the Star's Nadine Yousif
5:25 a.m. Essential workers in factories, construction, and manufacturing - sectors that have been hit hard by COVID-19 in the past year - remain ineligible for vaccination in Ontario based on their employment status alone.
Now those businesses in hot-spot areas have the opportunity to vaccinate their workforce after the province announced last week they could apply to hold vaccination clinics on-site and jump ahead of current vaccination requirements.
The move comes as Peel Region and Toronto are shuttering any workplace Friday that has at least five COVID-19 cases, to implement restrictions where the province has placed none.
The province is asking companies that want to set up on-site clinics to not only organize and pay for them, but to include vaccinating the larger community as well. This has left some employers confused about the process and unsure about meeting the requirements.
Public health experts told the Star that Ontario is pushing the responsibility of vaccinating essential workers - employed in places where the majority of Toronto's new COVID-19 cases originate - onto businesses and corporations that don't have the expertise to set up a clinic or engage in best practices, not to mention covering the cost.
Read the full story from the Star's Olivia Bowden
5:22 a.m. In Canada, the provinces are reporting 360,819 new vaccinations administered for a total of 11,158,636 doses given. Nationwide, 975,373 people or 2.6 per cent of the population has been fully vaccinated. The provinces have administered doses at a rate of 29,442.873 per 100,000.
There were 7,020 new vaccines delivered to the provinces and territories for a total of 13,692,894 doses delivered so far. The provinces and territories have used 81.49 per cent of their available vaccine supply.
5 a.m. British Columbia's solicitor general is to announce provincial travel restrictions today to help limit the spread of COVID-19.
Mike Farnworth is expected to give details of what the government views as essential travel while B.C. considers using roadblocks to discourage people from leaving their health authority region.
He has described the checkpoints as a type of "counterattack" that is usually used to find impaired drivers.
Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry says with current levels of transmission, travel will spread the virus even further in B.C.
However, a group that represents front-line RCMP officers has pushed back against the roadblocks, saying it puts more pressure on limited resources and exposes officers to further risk and possible COVID-19 infections.
The National Police Federation released a statement on Wednesday noting it has "grave concerns" about police taking part in enforcing a COVID-19 ban on non-essential travel.
Friday 4 a.m. Toronto and Peel Region could begin to order the temporary closure of some businesses Friday to control workplace COVID-19 outbreaks.
The orders from the top doctors in both regions were expected to come into effect today, a measure they both said was designed to protect tens of thousands of essential workers from the virus.
Both regions said the orders would close businesses with recent outbreaks of five or more linked cases in the past two weeks.
The shutdowns will last for 10 days and workers will have to self-isolate during that time.
Peel Region says it will post the names of the businesses closed under the order.
Public health experts and labour groups have called on the province to narrow the list of essential businesses permitted to remain open as virus cases surge.
10:00 p.m.: Sabina Vohra-Miller wants to cry every time she thinks of the COVID-19 surge that's devastating India - and fears Canada could face a similar scenario.
The unfairness. It's heartbreaking to see what's happening in India right now," said Vohra-Miller, who co-founded the South Asian Health Network in Toronto and has a master's degree in pharmacology.
And (to see) the parallels with what is happening here in Canada."
India's COVID-19 cases are out of control, rising by more than 300,000 in a single day this week. It's partly due to the B.1.617 variant, sometimes called the double mutant" variant, which was first detected in India and recently popped up in Quebec, Alberta and B.C.
Canada Thursday banned flights from India and Pakistan for 30 days, partly to contain the variant's spread.
Read the full explainer here: The double mutant' variant: what we know and don't know about the COVID-19 strain found in B.C., Alberta and Quebec
9:43 p.m.: In an alarming new trend, people are dying at home from COVID-19 as the third wave of the pandemic increasingly fills hospitals with patients who are younger and sicker.
Ontario's chief coroner says an average of two people a day have been succumbing to the disease at their houses or apartments in the last two weeks because symptoms can progress quickly with more contagious and dangerous variants.
That is in excess of anything that we saw during wave one and over wave two as well," Dr. Dirk Huyer told a news conference Thursday as the province reported 40 more COVID-19 deaths, the highest daily toll in two months.
People dying at home have ranged in age from their 30s to the 70s in a development that Huyer described as new, unfortunate and sad."
Read the full story here: COVID-19 variants are making people sicker so much faster that some are dying at home, coroner says