20211228

Delta says flight to Shanghai turned back because of new Covid rules The incident comes as China clamps down on Covid travel restrictions ahead of the Winter Olympics in Beijing.

Delta Air Lines said Monday that new pandemic-related cleaning requirements at a Shanghai airport were behind the turning back of a recent flight from Seattle in midair, a move that had prompted a protest from the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco.

An emailed statement said the new mandates at Shanghai Pudong International Airport “require significantly extended ground time and are not operationally viable for Delta.”

It wasn’t clear what the rules are and what prompted the change, but it comes as China tightens its already strict Covid-19 travel restrictions in the face of a growing outbreak in the city of Xi’an and ahead of the Winter Olympics in Beijing in six weeks.

Xi’an, which is about 600 miles southwest of Beijing, reported more than 300 new cases over the weekend, a sharp rise from previous days. The city of 13 million people has been locked down, with only one person per household allowed out every two days to shop for necessities.

The Delta flight that turned back to Seattle last week left passengers with expired Covid-19 test results and U.S. visas, according to Chinese media reports.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/delta-says-flight-shanghai-turned-back-new-covid-rules-rcna10041

"Haiti’s GANG Warfare"

In a country dominated by gangs, photographer Rodrigo Abd’s images show both armed gangsters and the residents they terrorise

The two images are as stark as what they represent: the cause and effect of Haiti’s increasing woes. In one, a masked and armed gangster keeps lookout on a Port-au-Prince rooftop, just a few blocks from the presidential palace. In the other, a family recently displaced by gang violence takes shelter in a school that now houses dozens of families, a stone’s throw from their homes.

“Port-au-Prince is almost entirely controlled by gangs, and we wanted to show the efforts of people that are running businesses to survive,” says Rodrigo Abd, 45, an Argentinian staff photographer with the Associated Press who took the images. “But I was also trying to show another side to Haiti, to avoid the stereotypes that we always repeat, to show the violent without the violence, or the poor without the poverty.”

Haiti is beset by overlapping crises. The country’s president, Jovenel Moïse, was assassinated in early July in circumstances that remain mysterious. A 7.2 magnitude earthquake wrecked the country’s rural south in August. In September, thousands of Haitian migrants that had been living across South America were deported from Texas after years away from their homeland.

Meanwhile, in the political vacuum, local rights groups estimate that as many as 165 gangs continue to terrorise residents, throwing up roadblocks and kidnapping rich and poor alike for ransom. Aid deliveries to the quake-struck south are often turned back by militiamen, who in October kidnapped a group of 17 US and Canadian missionary workers and their families. Over 600 people have been kidnapped in Haiti this year, over triple last year’s total. Fuel shortages have added to the woes, especially in a country without a reliable electrical grid.

“You can feel an aggressive landscape, that it is a place that could explode very easily and at any time, because the situation is so bad,” says Abd, who has photographed war zones around the world.

Abd has worked several times in Haiti, travelling to the Caribbean country first in 2004, just before the coup that removed then-president Jean-Bertrand Aristide from office in another wave of instability.

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/dec/28/it-could-explode-at-any-time-photographing-haitis-gang-warfare

Health Alert: Prepared meals recalled from Metro Vancouver supermarkets due to possible salmonella

The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) is warning residents of Metro Vancouver that various prepared meals are being recalled from supermarkets due to possible salmonella contamination.

T&T Supermarket Inc. is recalling various prepared meals from the marketplace due to possible salmonella contamination, explains a news release issued on Dec. 24.

The recalled products have been sold at the following stores in British Columbia:

Osaka Supermarket, 1000-3700 No. 3 Road, Richmond
T&T Supermarket, 147-4800 Kingsway, Burnaby
T&T Supermarket, MAJ1-8311 Lansdowne Road, Richmond
T&T Supermarket, 100-19705 Fraser Hwy, Langley

There have been no reported illnesses associated with the consumption of these products. However, the CFIA is conducting a food safety investigation and more products may be recalled.

Photo via The Canadian Food Inspection Agency

What you should do

If you think you became sick from consuming a recalled product, call your doctor
Check to see if you have the recalled products in your home
Do not consume the recalled products
Recalled products should be thrown out or returned to the location where they were purchased

Food contaminated with Salmonella may not look or smell spoiled but can still make you sick. Young children, pregnant women, the elderly and people with weakened immune systems may contract serious and sometimes deadly infections. Healthy people may experience short-term symptoms such as fever, headache, vomiting, nausea, abdominal cramps and diarrhea. Long-term complications may include severe arthritis.

https://www.burnabynow.com/local-news/health-alert-prepared-meals-recalled-from-metro-vancouver-supermarkets-due-to-possible-salmonella-4903898?utm_source=break.ma&utm_medium=break.ma

Multiple homes being evacuated after fire fully engulfs house in Brampton

The fire was reported shortly before 10:00 p.m. at 4 Gatesgill St, near the intersection of Bovaird Dr W and Main St N.Police say the home has become fully engulfed in flames.

Neighbouring houses are being evacuated and injuries are currently unknown.

https://www.insauga.com/residents-being-evacuated-after-fire-fully-engulfs-house-in-brampton/?utm_source=break.ma&utm_medium=break.ma

Police charge Oshawa business owners in drug investigation

On Tuesday, Dec. 21, investigators executed a search warrant at two businesses on John Street West in Oshawa: City Patties and Convenience Plus.

During the search, police say investigators seized a quantity of cash, more than 500 grams of cannabis, and other drug paraphernalia.

Andre Rankine, age 36, of Grandview Street in Oshawa, and Nicole Teelucksingh, age 49, of Dunkirk Avenue in Oshawa, were each charged with Possess Cannabis for the Purpose of Selling and Sell Cannabis to an Adult. Rankine was also charged with Possess Cannabis for the Purpose of Distributing and other tobacco-related charges.

https://www.insauga.com/police-charge-oshawa-business-owners-in-drug-investigation/?utm_source=break.ma&utm_medium=break.ma

Joe Biden has his own ways of complicating Canada’s relationship with the U.S.

https://www.wellandtribune.ca/ts/news/world/2021/12/28/joe-biden-has-his-own-ways-of-complicating-canadas-relationship-with-the-us.html

New Omicron variant fills up children's hospitals in the U.S.

New Omicron variant fills up children's hospitals in the U.S.Healthcare workers put on PPE on the COVID-19 ICU floor of the University of Massachusetts (UMass) Memorial Hospital in Worcester, Massachusetts, U.S., on Monday, Dec. 27, 2021. (Allison Dinner/Bloomberg/Getty Images/CNN)

A five-fold increase in pediatric admissions in New York City this month. Close to double the numbers admitted in Washington, D.C. And nationwide, on average, pediatric hospitalizations in the U.S. are up 35 per cent in just the past week.

The highly transmissible Omicron variant is teaming up with the busy holiday season to infect more children across the United States than ever before, and children's hospitals are bracing for it to get even worse.

"I think we are going to see more numbers now than we have ever seen," Dr. Stanley Spinner, who is chief medical officer and vice president at Texas Children's Pediatrics & Urgent Care in Houston, told CNN.

MORE KIDS IN HOSPITALS

Across the country, pediatricians are bracing for a busy January.

"It's almost like you can see the train coming down the track and you're just hoping it doesn't go off the rails," Dr. Claudia Hoyen, director of pediatric infection control at UH Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital in Cleveland told CNN.

"It's going to be a very interesting couple of weeks. We've just had all of these kids mixing together with everybody else during Christmas. We have one more holiday to get through with New Year's, and then we'll be sending everybody back to school," Hoyen said.

"Everybody is kind of waiting on the edge, wondering what we'll end up seeing."

And while the Delta variant infected more children than previous variants, Omicron is looking even worse, Spinner said.

"What's concerning on the (pediatric) side is that, unlike the adults -- where they're reporting for the number of adults getting infected relatively low numbers getting hospitalized -- what we're really seeing, we think, is an increasing number of kids being hospitalized," Spinner said.

"So that is a concern to us, especially with those that can't be vaccinated under 5 or those that are not fully vaccinated or not vaccinated at all that are eligible over 5. So it is a big concern."

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/new-omicron-variant-fills-up-children-s-hospitals-in-the-u-s-1.5721007?utm_source=break.ma&utm_medium=break.ma

12,833 new COVID-19 cases in Quebec, increase from previous days

12,833 new COVID-19 cases in Quebec, staggering increase from previous days

This brings the total number of people infected to 559,270.

Since the start of the pandemic, there have only been two other days that the province recorded more than 10,000 cases: 10,246 on Dec. 22 and 10,713 on Dec. 23, according to the Institut national de santé publique du Québec (INSPQ).

HOSPITALIZATIONS

Hospitalizations are up by 88, bringing the number of people in Quebec hospitals to 702.

Of those, 115 people are in intensive care; up by six.

Health officials note the risk of infection for people who are not vaccinated is 1.2 times that of someone who received two doses and the risk of hospitalization is 12.1 times someone who is fully vaccinated.

VACCINATION CAMPAIGN

Quebec's health care professionals administered 59,691 more vaccinations, for a total of 15,005,169 doses given in the province.

As of Dec. 27, a total of 7,260,432 Quebecers, or 89 per cent of the eligible population aged five and up, have received their first dose of a vaccine and 6,657,312 people, or 82 per cent, have received two.

Of those eligible for a third dose, 1,087,425 Quebecers, or 13 per cent, have received it.

VARIANT TRACKER

According to the Institut national de santé publique du Québec (INSPQ), the number of Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant cases is now 3,306.

The numbers currently stand at 45,665 Alpha (B.1.1.7), 460 Bêta (B.1.351), 610 Gamma (P.1) and 32,804 Delta (B.1.167.2).

https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/12-833-new-covid-19-cases-in-quebec-staggering-increase-from-previous-days-1.5721125?utm_source=break.ma&utm_medium=break.ma

Police, coroner investigating after inmate dies at Regina Reintegration Unit

Investigations are ongoing after a 59-year-old male inmate was found unresponsive and died in his room at the Regina Reintegration Unit on Dec. 23.

Corrections staff called EMS and initiated unsuccessful life-saving measures. The inmate was declared deceased at approximately 10:20 p.m. Thursday.

The unit, located in the city, is a reduced custody setting for inmates deemed a low-risk to the public. It offers programming to help inmates reintegrate into the community.

The Regina Police Service and the Saskatchewan Coroners Service are investigating. The Ministry of Corrections, Policing and Public Safety will also be conducting an internal investigation.

In Saskatchewan, a coroner’s inquest is mandatory when a death happens to a person held in custody. There is an exception if the person in custody died from natural causes and the death is not preventable.

The ministry said in a release Tuesday the death is not related to COVID-19 and the man’s next of kin have been notified.

https://leaderpost.com/news/local-news/police-coroner-investigating-after-inmate-dies-at-regina-reintegration-unit?utm_source=break.ma&utm_medium=break.ma