Today’s coronavirus news: North Korea boasts recovery as WHO worries over missing data
The latest coronavirus news from Canada and around the world Wednesday. This file will be updated throughout the day. Web links to longer stories if available.
9:30 a.m. Germany plans to spend another 830 million euros ($872 million) to buy new coronavirus vaccines that will allow the country to deal with a series of possible variants this fall, the health minister said Wednesday.
Health Minister Karl Lauterbach said that the government, via the European Union, already has ordered enough of the existing vaccines and of one that has been developed by Germany's BioNTech to counter the omicron variant. He said the new funding is earmarked for a vaccine being developed by Moderna to tackle both omicron and other variants.
We are betting on a broad portfolio of vaccines; we must be prepared for all eventualities," Lauterbach said. We don't know what variants will confront us in the fall."
One lesson from the pandemic is that we never again want to have too little vaccine," he added, alluding to the sluggish start early last year of the EU's and Germany's COVID-19 vaccination campaign. We want to be able to offer all those who need or want it a fourth shot."
The minister left open, however, whether a fourth vaccine shot will be recommended for everyone, saying that will depend on what variant comes later this year.
The existing recommendation from Germany's independent vaccine advisory panel, issued in February, calls for an additional booster for people aged 70 and above among other high-risk groups, including residents of nursing homes, people with immunodeficiency and medical staff.
7:45 a.m. The ongoing baby formula shortage that has plagued the U.S. for weeks and left parents scrambling to stock up is starting to spill over into Canada.
Worries about the shortage north of the border have experts and consumers asking why Canada isn't producing more of its own formula - and why the biggest formula producer in the country doesn't sell to Canadians.
Product shortages in the U.S. began in mid-2021 and were due in large part to a shortage of some raw ingredients used to make the formula, along with pandemic-related global supply issues.
The shortfall was further exacerbated in February, when certain Similac, Alimentum and EleCare products were recalled after reports of bacterial infections in four infants who consumed the powdered infant formula. All four infants were hospitalized, and two died.
Read the full story from the Star's Rosa Saba
7:20 a.m. An Ontario doctor alleged to have written improper COVID-19 vaccine exemptions for hundreds of dollars a pop also reportedly told patients that opposing vaccine mandates was like being in the resistance against the Nazis and that half the people who get vaccinated will die.
That's according to recent court filings in a case brought to the Divisional Court by Dr. Celeste Jean Thirlwell against her own professional regulator, the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario.
Thirlwell, a psychiatrist who also practises sleep medicine, was investigated by the college last year over reports that she was issuing and helping individuals obtain COVID vaccine exemptions. In November, the college ordered Thirlwell not to issue any exemptions for COVID vaccines, face masks or testing for the disease and, among other things, to consent to allow the college to view her OHIP billings.
Read the full story from the Star's Kenyon Wallace and May Warren
Wednesday 5:52 a.m.: North Korea on Wednesday added hundreds of thousands of infections to its growing pandemic caseload but also said that a million people have already recovered from suspected COVID-19 just a week after disclosing an outbreak, a public health crisis it appears to be trying to manage in isolation as global experts express deep concern about dire consequences.
The country's anti-virus headquarters announced 232,880 new cases of fever and another six deaths in state media Wednesday. Those figures raise its totals to 62 deaths and more than 1.7 million fever cases since late April. It said more than a million people recovered but at least 691,170 remain in quarantine.
Outside experts believe most of the fevers are from COVID-19 but North Korea lacks tests to confirm so many. The outbreak is almost certainly larger than the fever tally, since some virus carriers may not develop fevers or other symptoms.