More than 115 cases of eye damage reported in Ontario after solar eclipse
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
Australia is on track to allow borders to reopen by Christmas, the country's minister for trade, tourism and investments said on Wednesday, September 22.
"I do empathize with the Australians who have been denied the opportunity to travel overseas this year," Tourism Minister Dan Tehan said during a talk that was organized by the National Press Club of Australia but broadcast online due to coronavirus restrictions.
He added: "It's another reason why everyone should get vaccinated and we have to stick to the national plan that will see our international border open up -- at this rate by Christmas at the latest."
Earlier this week, Tehan laid out some of the tasks that will need to happen to get the country on the road to reopening.
"It's incredibly important that we're doing that preparatory work," he said. One of those action items is passing the 80% national vaccination rate. As of September 22, about 38% of Australians had received both doses of a coronavirus vaccine.
The national vaccine rollout has been so vital that Australia's tourism board created a special domestic ad urging people to get jabbed.
The "It's Our Best Shot for Travel" campaign was unveiled on August 16.
"We need to claim back our way of life so that we can visit friends and relatives, get back into the workplace, get our kids back to school, travel domestically and internationally again, and welcome the world back to enjoy all that Australia has to offer," Phillipa Harrison, managing director of Tourism Australia (the country's official national tourism board) said in a press statement when the campaign debuted.
International visitors to Australia will need to verify that they are fully vaccinated before entering the country.
Australia also plans to test out "vaccine passports" with other countries: Singapore, Japan and the United States are reportedly on the list.
Tehan has also been coordinating with the aviation industry.
Qantas, the country's national carrier, announced that it would slowly resume international flights beginning in October.
Australia closed its borders to non-residents in March 2020 and employed a mandatory quarantine system, which severely limited the number of people who could return to the country each week.
In July, Australian public broadcaster ABC reported that 38,000 Australians were on the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade's wait list to repatriate. The Australian government also imposed rules largely preventing residents from departing the country.
The states of New South Wales (home to Australia's most populous city, Sydney) and South Australia are piloting programs to allow vaccinated travelers to quarantine at home.
Australia has a population of about 25 million. Of that number, there have been 90,369 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 1,186 deaths.
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
A Sherwood Park family says their new house is uninhabitable. The McNaughton's say they were forced to leave the house after living there for only a week because contaminants inside made it difficult to breathe.
A man has been handed a lengthy hunting ban and fined thousands of dollars for illegally killing a grizzly bear, B.C. conservation officers say.
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) says it's investigating an interaction between a uniformed officer and anti-Trudeau government protestors after a video circulated on social media.
An emergency slide fell off a Delta Air Lines jetliner shortly after takeoff Friday from New York, and pilots who felt a vibration in the plane circled back to land safely at JFK Airport.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
George Mallory is renowned for being one of the first British mountaineers to attempt to scale the dizzying heights of Mount Everest during the 1920s. Nearly a century later, newly digitized letters shed light on Mallory’s hopes and fears about ascending Everest.
A loud explosion was heard across Hamilton on Friday after a propane tank was accidentally destroyed and detonated at a local scrap metal yard, police say.
As if a 4-0 Edmonton Oilers lead in Game 1 of their playoff series with the Los Angeles Kings wasn't good enough, what was announced at Rogers Place during the next TV timeout nearly blew the roof off the downtown arena.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”