“China eats weird animals disease”

The restrictions were supposed to be in effect until at least Jan. 26 but lifting them was contingent on improving public health indicators.

According to multiple sources, the Ford government now plans to allow 50 per cent capacity in restaurants as of Jan. 31 and will gradually lift other public health restrictions throughout the month of February.

At this point it remains unclear when other sectors that are currently prohibited from operating, such as gyms and theatres, will be able to reopen but Premier Doug Ford did appear to suggest that “positive news” was coming for shuttered business while speaking with a cameraperson at Queen’s Park earlier on Wednesday.

It may be unpopular to stand up for travellers during COVID-19, but violations of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms should concern every Canadian. Reports coming out of the U.S. suggest our federal government is de facto denying Canadian citizens a key right : the one to enter, remain in, or leave Canada.

Boris Johnson has announced the end of all Covid measures introduced to combat the Omicron variant – compulsory mask-wearing on public transport and in shops, guidance to work from home and vaccine certificates – from next week.

The prime minister also told the Commons that the legal requirement on people with coronavirus to self-isolate would be allowed to lapse when the regulations expired on 24 March, and that date could be brought forward.

To cheers from some on the Conservative benches, Johnson announced an immediate end to the need for pupils to wear masks at secondary schools.

Hong Kong to kill 2,000 small animals after hamsters blamed for COVID-19 outbreak in closed-off city

Authorities in Hong Kong will euthanize some 2,000 hamsters and other small animals after a minor COVID-19 outbreak was linked to a pet shop in the city.

Speaking at a news conference Tuesday, Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan said preliminary testing had returned positive results for a number of animals at the Little Boss pet shop in Causeway Bay, after a 23-year-old employee tested positive for the Delta variant Sunday.

The fast-moving omicron variant may cause less severe disease on average, but COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. are climbing and modelers forecast 50,000 to 300,000 more Americans could die by the time the wave subsides in mid-March.

The seven-day rolling average for daily new COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. has been trending upward since mid-November, reaching nearly 1,700 on Jan. 17 — still below the peak of 3,300 in January 2021. COVID-19 deaths among nursing home residents started rising slightly two weeks ago, although still at a rate 10 times less than last year before most residents were vaccinated.

Even a fourth shot of a COVID-19 vaccine is “not good enough” to prevent Omicron, according to a preliminary study in Israel.

Sheba Hospital last month tested a fourth shot given to more than 270 medical workers, with 154 getting the Pfizer jab and 120 receiving Moderna.

The researchers revealed Monday that both groups showed a “slightly higher” increase in antibodies than after the third shot — but still not enough to prevent Omicron, the latest variant responsible for the vast majority of infections around the world.

A new study reveals that more than 40 percent of positive results in rapid antigen tests are false, findings that come at a time when provinces are increasingly relying on the rapid tests to form COVID-19 response strategies.

The study, conducted by the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, was published in the JAMA peer-reviewed journal on Jan. 7, 2022. The researchers studied the results of roughly 900,000 rapid antigen tests taken in over 530 workplaces across Canada between Jan. 11 and Oct. 13, 2021.

Seemingly baffled, Ontario Superior Court Justice Edward Morgan didn’t quite know what to say when told only one of the four defendants for a hearing showed up.

It was a landmark hearing for Ontario. Four doctors — Rochagne Kilian, Mary O’Connor, Mark Trozzi and Patrick Phillips — had been scheduled to appear to fight legal proceedings brought by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO) late last year.

Trozzi, O’Connor and Kilian have been accused by the CPSO of failing to comply with investigations into allegations they issued false medical exemptions for the COVID-19 vaccine. Phillips, the CPSO says, is threatening to re-release a tranche of confidential documents on Twitter.