Today’s coronavirus news: Ontario Liberals promise $1B to clear surgery backlog from pandemic
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.
10:45 a.m. Ontario is reporting 1,528 COVID-19 hospitalizations and 176 in ICU. There were 29 more deaths reported.
10 a.m. The Ontario Liberals are promising to put $1 billion over two years toward clearing a surgical backlog.
Liberal Leader Steven Del Duca says the COVID-19 pandemic has put an incredible strain on health-care services and health-care professionals.
He says a Liberal government would put the additional funding into allowing hospitals to operate "significantly" above pre-pandemic volumes and expand operating room and diagnostic procedures into evenings and weekends.
The Ontario Medical Association estimated last fall that the pandemic had created a backlog of 20 million health-care services including doctors' visits, diagnostic tests, treatments and surgeries.
9:30 a.m. Hamilton ended its state of emergency for COVID-19 despite the pandemic continuing to take a steep toll on the city's hospitals.
The municipal emergency declaration has been in place since April 17, 2020. It was lifted Tuesday - days after Hamilton Health Sciences put out a COVID update to the community on Friday that flagged staffing and capacity pressures are severe and ongoing."
Hamilton's hospitals had 299 staff and physicians self-isolating Tuesday. At the same time, the hospitals were caring for 135 COVID patients. Occupancy was 112 per cent at Juravinski Hospital and 110 per cent at Hamilton General Hospital. Ideal is 85 per cent to 90 per cent.
In addition, there were five ongoing COVID outbreaks in the hospitals - three at Hamilton General, one at the Charlton Campus of St. Joseph's Healthcare and one at the Satellite Health Facility.
8:45 a.m. Jimmy Kimmel had COVID-19 and lived to tell late-night audiences about it.
The "Jimmy Kimmel Live" host on Monday detailed his bout with the infection last week during his monologue, explaining how his young daughter infected him and his wife, Molly. His symptoms included fatigue and headache - "also the symptoms of having children," he said.
"I tested positive on Monday. By Friday afternoon the virus just took a look around my body and said, 'Yuck. I'm getting out of here,'" he quipped, noting that he otherwise "had it easy."
"Let me tell you, I drank so much bleach, my teeth are whiter than a fundraiser at Mar-A-Lago, look at that," he said, making fun of former President Donald Trump's dangerous notion in April 2020 that ingesting disinfectants was a panacea.
Kimmel previously said that he was vaccinated and boosted but on Monday explained that he boasted about avoiding the infection so well that he felt that "he deserved COVID."
8 a.m. Coronavirus conditions are likely to worsen, with case rates continuing to rise and hospitalizations starting to increase, according to the top health official in the San Francisco Bay Area's most populous county.
"We are also seeing a pretty significant uptick in reports of outbreaks, from schools, work sites and other congregate facilities," Dr. Sara Cody, the Santa Clara County public health director and health officer, said at a news conference Tuesday. "Many of them are related to social gatherings. It's spring - school is ending and people are gathering, and COVID is spreading."
Caution is especially needed as it's becoming clear that the latest omicron subvariants that are circulating can reinfect people who survived the first strains of the omicron variant back in December or January. Experts had said that the first omicron subvariant, BA.1, likely conferred immunity against a newer subvariant, BA.2.
But some experts say that surviving BA.1 may not confer a high likelihood of avoiding infection with an even newer subvariant, BA.2.12.1, which is more infectious than BA.2.
7:22 a.m. York Region's newest hospital hit the ground running when it opened in a pandemic last year.
When Cortellucci Vaughan was first planned as Ontario's first new hospital in more than 30 years, it was to meet the needs of a growing south York Region.
Then the coronavirus hit and plans took a 180-degree turn.
With COVID-19 cases skyrocketing in February 2021, the hospital opened to become the province's relief valve, a much-needed space for an overstretched health-care system.
6:41 a.m. Testing for COVID-19 has plummeted across the globe, making it much tougher for scientists to track the course of the pandemic and spot new, worrisome viral mutants as they emerge and spread.
Experts say testing has dropped by 70 to 90 per cent worldwide from the first to the second quarter of this year - the opposite of what they say should be happening with new omicron variants on the rise in places such as the United States and South Africa.
We're not testing anywhere near where we might need to," said Dr. Krishna Udayakumar, who directs the Duke Global Health Innovation Center at Duke University. We need the ability to ramp up testing as we're seeing the emergence of new waves or surges to track what's happening" and respond.
Reported daily cases in the U.S., for example, are averaging 73,633, up more than 40 per cent over the past two weeks, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. But that is a vast undercount because of the testing downturn and the fact tests are being taken at home and not reported to health departments. An influential modelling group at the University of Washington in Seattle estimates that only 13 per cent of cases are being reported to health authorities in the U.S. - which would mean more than a half million new infections every day.
The drop in testing is global but the overall rates are especially inadequate in the developing world, Udayakumar said. The number of tests per 1,000 people in high income countries is around 96 times higher than it is in low income countries, according to the Geneva-based public health non-profit FIND.
What's driving the drop? Experts point to COVID fatigue, a lull in cases after the first omicron wave and a sense among some residents of low-income countries that there's no reason to test because they lack access to antiviral medications.
6:41 a.m. Coronavirus conditions are likely to worsen, with case rates continuing to rise and hospitalizations starting to increase, according to the top health official in the San Francisco Bay Area's most populous county.
We are also seeing a pretty significant uptick in reports of outbreaks, from schools, work sites and other congregate facilities," Dr. Sara Cody, the Santa Clara County public health director and health officer, said at a news conference Tuesday. Many of them are related to social gatherings. It's spring - school is ending and people are gathering, and COVID is spreading."
Caution is especially needed as it's becoming clear that the latest omicron subvariants that are circulating can reinfect people who survived the first strains of the Omicron variant back in December or January. Experts had said that the first omicron subvariant, BA.1, likely conferred immunity against a newer subvariant, BA.2.
But some experts say that surviving BA.1 may not confer a high likelihood of avoiding infection with an even newer subvariant, BA.2.12.1, which is more infectious than BA.2.
Even if you got omicron during the omicron surge, you can still get COVID again, unfortunately," Cody said.
6:35 a.m. Shanghai reaffirmed Wednesday it would maintain the zero-COVID" approach to eliminate a waning outbreak in China's largest city after the head of the World Health Organization said it was not sustainable and urged China to change strategies.
While progress has been made, relaxing prevention and control measures could allow the virus to rebound, deputy director of Shanghai's Center for Disease Control Wu Huanyu told reporters.
At the same time, now is also the most difficult and critical moment for our city to achieve zero-COVID," Wu said at a daily briefing.
Should we relax our vigilance, the epidemic may rebound, so it is necessary to persistently implement the prevention and control work without relaxing," he said.
Wu gave no indication he was aware of the comments by WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who said he had discussing with Chinese experts the need to change to a new approach in light of new knowledge about the virus.
When we talk about the zero-COVID,' we don't think that it's sustainable, considering the behaviour of the virus now and what we anticipate in the future," Tedros said at a news briefing Tuesday.
And especially when we have now a good knowledge, understanding of the virus and when we have good tools to use, transitioning to another strategy will be very important," he said.
Tedros was joined by Mike Ryan, the WHO's emergencies chief, who said all pandemic control actions should show due respect to individual and human rights."
Countries need to balance the control measures, the impact on society, the impact on the economy. That is not always an easy calibration to make," Ryan said.