Today’s coronavirus news: U.S. has lowest new-case total in over a year; active cases drop in Alberta, Saskatchewan; Ontario reports 1,691 new cases
The latest coronavirus news from Canada and around the world Sunday. This file will be updated throughout the day. Web links to longer stories if available.
9:00 p.m.: The United States on Sunday reported 13,480 new coronavirus cases, the country's lowest daily total since March 25, 2020, as observed by several news sites.
6:28 p.m.: Alberta's active-case total continued its plunge on Sunday. The province reporting 563 additional COVID-19 cases and six new deaths. The province's chief medical health officer, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, says there are currently 14,533 active cases - down 969 from Saturday - with 581 patients in hospital, including 162 in ICU.
The province's daily vaccination total was 46,062 and Hinshaw said the new cases were identified from 6,944 tests, for a positivity rate of eight per cent.
Active cases also dropped on Sunday in Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and Nunavut, while rising in New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Manitoba.
5:34 p.m.: Saskatchewan is reporting 116 new COVID-19 cases, 222 recoveries and one additional death linked to the virus on Sunday.
The province now has 1,662 cases that are considered active - its lowest total since March 25. Saskatchewan, where vaccination is now available to those aged 12 and up, reported 11,004 new jabs for the day.
4:45 p.m.: The Wall Street Journal is reporting that researchers from China's Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care, according to a previously undisclosed U.S. intelligence report that could add weight to growing calls for a fuller probe of whether the COVID-19 virus may have escaped from the laboratory.
The details of the reporting go beyond a State Department fact sheet, issued during the final days of the Trump administration, which said that several researchers at the lab, a centre for the study of coronaviruses and other pathogens, became sick in autumn 2019 with symptoms consistent with both COVID-19 and common seasonal illness."
The disclosure of the number of researchers, the timing of their illnesses and their hospital visits come on the eve of a meeting of the World Health Organization's decision-making body, which is expected to discuss the next phase of an investigation into COVID-19's origins.
Current and former officials familiar with the intelligence about the lab researchers expressed differing views about the strength of the supporting evidence for the assessment. One person said that it was potentially significant but still in need of further investigation; another person described the intelligence as being of exquisite quality. It was very precise. What it didn't tell you was exactly why they got sick."
November 2019 is roughly when many epidemiologists and virologists believe SARS-CoV-2, the virus behind the pandemic, first began circulating around the central Chinese city of Wuhan. The Wuhan Institute hasn't shared raw data, safety logs and lab records on its extensive work with coronaviruses in bats, which many consider the most likely source of the virus. China has repeatedly denied that the virus escaped from one of its labs.
4:30 p.m.: The United States is adding fewer than 30,000 COVID-19 cases a day for the first time since June, and deaths are as low as they've been since summer. Nearly everywhere, the outlook for the country is improving.
More than 61 per cent of American adults have received at least one vaccine shot, and although the pace has slowed, the share is still growing by about two percentage points per week.
I think by June, we're probably going to be at one infection per 100,000 people per day, which is a very low level," Dr. Scott Gottlieb, former head of the Food and Drug Administration, said Sunday on the CBS show Face the Nation."
The share of coronavirus tests coming back positive has fallen to below three per cent for the first time since widespread testing began, and the number of hospitalized patients has fallen to its lowest point in 11 months, Dr. Eric Topol of the Scripps Research Translational Institute noted this past week. For the first time since March 5, 2020, San Francisco General Hospital had no COVID patients - a truly momentous day," Vivek Jain, an infectious-disease physician at the hospital, said Thursday.
The U.S. is reporting about 25,700 coronavirus cases daily, a 39 per cent decrease from two weeks ago. Deaths are down 14 per cent over the same period to an average of 578 per day.
1:02 p.m.: The Department of National Defence says Canadian military personnel are coming forward in droves to be vaccinated, with more than 85 per cent of all troops receiving at least one dose.
That stands in contrast to an apparent rash of vaccine hesitancy in the United States military, where some reports have suggested as many as one-third of American troops have declined to get a shot.
Defence Department spokesman Daniel Le Bouthillier says the majority of unvaccinated Canadian service members are on leave or in remote locations with limited access, and have not declined to get jabbed.
Military personnel are being vaccinated faster than the rest of Canadians, with only half of the general population having received at least one dose.
12:45 p.m.: Quebec health authorities are reporting 505 new cases of COVID-19, the lowest number since September.
Vaccination across the province continues apace, with some Quebecers under 18 starting to receive shots on Friday in Nicolet and Shawinigan, northeast of Montreal.
The Health Department says it administered more than 96,000 doses in the past 24 hours for a total of 4.84 million.
Quebec's public health institute said Friday that 52.5 per cent of all Quebecers have received at least one dose of vaccine as the rollout ramps up.
The province is reporting seven new deaths linked to the virus, one of which took place in the past 24 hours.
Hospitalizations dropped by 13 to 424, while the number of patients in intensive care decreased by three to 103.
11:49 a.m.: A health unit in Montreal has ordered extra doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine after experiencing what a spokesman described as exceptional demand from teens and their families.
Carl Theriault of the Integrated Health and Social Services University Network for West-Central Montreal says that while appointment booking for youth aged 12 and up officially starts on Tuesday, officials at the walk-clinic at Bill-Durnam arena decided to begin accepting teens over the weekend.
He says the word quickly spread, and as of this morning the lineup stretched around the block, with most of the demand coming from young people and their families.
He says the clinic ran out of doses by 9 a.m. but has ordered 500 extra for both today and tomorrow.
Meanwhile, the number of new COVID-19 cases in Montreal dipped below the 500 mark for the first time since September, with 477 new infections.
Hospitalizations dropped by three to 421, while the number of people in intensive care remained stable at 103.
10:40 a.m.: Ontario administered 140,330 new doses of COVID-19 vaccines as of 8 p.m. Saturday, raising the total number of vaccines given across the province to more than 8 million.
More than 7.53 million Ontarians have now received at least one shot, which works out roughly 51.1 per cent of the total population. Meanwhile, 531,603 have been fully vaccinated with two doses.
10:17 a.m.: Ontario is reporting another 1,691 COVID-19 cases and 15 more deaths, according to its latest report released Sunday morning.
The seven-day average is at 1,878 cases daily, or 90 weekly per 100,000. Ontario's seven-day average for deaths is at 18.4 daily.
The province says 31,227 tests were completed the previous day, and there was a 5.7 per cent positivity rate.
There are 1,041 people currently hospitalized with COVID-19 in the province, including 693 patients in intensive care. There are 480 people on ventilators.
Locally, Health Minister Christine Elliott says 455 cases are in Toronto, 326 in Peel Region and 173 in York Region.
Read the fully story by the Star's Ann Marie Elpa here.
10 a.m.: British health officials expressed optimism Sunday that the coronavirus restrictions remaining in England can be lifted in June after an official study found that the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines offer effective protection against the variant first identified in India.
Jenny Harries, chief executive of the U.K. Health Security Agency, said officials in England are on track to proceed with the final stage of unlocking the country from June 21 if the public remains cautious.
A study by Public Health England found that the Pfizer vaccine is 88% effective against the variant after two doses. The AstraZeneca jab was 60 per cent effective after both doses.
The study, which took place between Apr. 5 and May 16, found that the jab was almost as effective against symptomatic disease from the Indian strain as it is against the dominant Kent variant.
Both vaccines were only 33 per cent effective against symptomatic disease from the Indian variant three weeks after the first dose - compared with about 50 per cent against the Kent strain.
Authorities in Britain have expressed concern in recent weeks that increasing cases of the Indian variant could jeopardize the U.K.'s so-far-successful plan to reopen its economy. More than 2,880 cases of the Indian variant have been recorded in England, figures show.
9:45 a.m.: Caroline Granger couldn't imagine a worse year for her small winery.
Granger said that the COVID-19 pandemic has damaged almost every aspect of The Grange of Prince Edward Vineyards and Estate Winery in Hillier, Ont., which she runs with her daughter.
I'm a farmer and a worrier and I love to make up all the bad things that could possibly happen and I could never imagine such a perfect storm," she said.
Granger estimates that in a typical year 50 per cent of her revenue comes from retail sales, either at local liquor stores, restaurants, or from wine enthusiasts visiting her farm and purchasing bottles after a tasting.
But Ontario's ongoing COVID-19 restrictions have prevented her from hosting oenophiles and the restaurants she partners with are closed for in-person dining. That leaves the LCBO and online sales as income sources.
At the same time, the grapes still have to come off the vine.
7:20 a.m. Ontarians aged 12 and up can book COVID-19 vaccines through the provincial system starting today.
They can book through the provincial online portal, call centre and through pharmacies offering the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.
The age group is becoming eligible a week ahead of schedule.
The province says it made the change at the request of public health units.
Some public health units and pop-up clinics had already started vaccinating youngsters, but the move makes access more equitable across Ontario.
Only the Pfizer vaccine has been approved for use in people between the ages of 12 and 18.
7 a.m.: Even through provincial health authorities have indicated youth with underlying conditions, including developmental delays and Down syndrome, are a priority for the COVID-19 vaccine, impromptu pop-ups and clinics across the city and beyond are simultaneously vaccinating any kids in the age group. And bookings for kids with and without underlying conditions has already begun in certain hot spots.
Dr. Lennox Huang, executive sponsor for the Toronto Health Sector Youth Vaccination Table and Sick Kids chief medical officer and vice president of Medical and Academic Affairs, told the Star that while the rollout may seem a tad on the fly, there is intentionality to it. And, the strategy to vaccinate both medically-vulnerable youth and youth in hot-spot postal codes at the same time is the right strategy. Both, he says, seem different, but may share the same risk.
We are looking at the big picture here," he says. And we're working on so many different levels."
To make sure youth with health conditions are a priority, Huang says, Sick Kids is holding its first-ever vaccine clinic on Saturday by appointment only. Over the last few days, he says, Sick Kids staff have been reaching out to patients on their high-risk list, to book them and their caregivers for the roughly 500 vaccines.
Read the full story by the Star's Michele Henry.
5 a.m.: Ontario hospitals continue to operate in a state of emergency" to cope with hundreds of critically ill COVID-19 patients, even as daily case counts drop and officials prepare for an economic reopening next month.
And while modelling presented Thursday by the province's top medical advisers projects a continued decline of new cases into the summer, barring the arrival of any yet-unknown variants of concern, critical care physicians stress that ICU occupancy due to COVID-19 is almost twice what it was at the peak of Wave 2, and the burden of the virus is preventing overstretched hospitals from tackling a growing backlog of surgeries.
This is not sustainable over the long run," said Dr. Kali Barrett. This is a crisis management situation we are in right now in Ontario hospitals."
Read the full story by the Star's Kenyon Wallace and Megan Ogilvie.
4 a.m.: Health Canada says up to 37 million doses of vaccine could be shipped in May and June, but only 20.3 million doses of Pfizer-BioNTech and 1.04 million doses of Moderna are confirmed. The remaining 11.3 million doses of Moderna, and another four million doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca from various sources are still tentative.
Provinces initially suspended giving AstraZeneca shots to people under the age of 55 based on an advisory committee's advice, but their recommendation changed on April 23 to reflect that the shot is safe for anyone aged 30 and older.
More than 655,000 doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine from the global vaccine sharing alliance known as COVAX, were scheduled to arrive and be distributed to provinces this week, but most provinces said they would put them on ice in reserve for second doses.
Half of Canada's population has now received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine.
The latest federal figures show just over 18 million people had received a shot as of Friday evening (May 21).
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says by the summer, Canada will have enough vaccines so that every eligible resident will have gotten their first dose, and by September, it will have enough doses for everyone to be fully vaccinated.
4 a.m.: The latest numbers on COVID-19 vaccinations in Canada as of 4:00 a.m. ET on Sunday May 23, 2021. In Canada, the provinces are reporting 385,214 new vaccinations administered for a total of 20,714,198 doses given.
Nationwide, 1,628,992 people or 4.3 per cent of the population has been fully vaccinated. The provinces have administered doses at a rate of 54,655.919 per 100,000.
There were 232,660 new vaccines delivered to the provinces and territories for a total of 23,575,754 doses delivered so far. The provinces and territories have used 87.86 per cent of their available vaccine supply.