Spring allergy season has begun. Where is it worse in Canada?
The spring allergy season has started early in many parts of Canada, with high levels of pollen in some cities already. Experts weigh in on which areas have it worse so far this season.
The U.S. says it will allow Canadians into the country who have received a mixed COVID-19 vaccine schedule, when the U.S. opens its borders to fully vaccinated travellers on Nov. 8.
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that although it has not recommended mixing doses for Americans, “we recognize that this is increasingly common in other countries so should be accepted for the interpretation of vaccine records."
Canada and some other countries have allowed the mixing of viral vector vaccines like AstraZeneca with the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines, while the U.S. has not.
With nearly four million Canadians having received a mixed vaccine schedule -- including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau -- the question of whether other countries would recognize their status as fully vaccinated has been an ongoing concern, particularly as borders begin reopening to fully vaccinated travellers.
Travellers are considered fully vaccinated if they have had both doses of a two-dose vaccine or one dose of a single-dose regimen at least two weeks before the travel date.
The announcement by the CDC is the latest in a series of developments this week that marks the beginning of the end of the closures along the world’s longest undefended border that has lasted a record 19 months. U.S. and Canada closed its land borders to all non-essential travel on March 21, 2020, 10 days after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared a pandemic.
Earlier this week, the CDC said it would recognize air travellers who had been fully vaccinated with any vaccine approved or recognized for emergency use by the WHO or the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). This would include AstraZeneca’s COVID-19 vaccine, even though it has not yet been approved for use in the U.S. Friday’s update made clear that the same policy would apply for those travelling to the U.S. by land.
The CDC updated its public health recommendations for fully vaccinated individuals on Friday, and said that “for the purposes of interpretation of vaccination records” individuals were considered fully vaccinated two weeks after receiving the last dose of an FDA or WHO approved or authorized vaccine, “or any combination of two doses of an FDA approved/authorized or WHO emergency use listed COVID-19 two-dose series.” While the recommended interval between the first and second doses vary, the CDC added that it would recognize any regimen where the second dose was “received no earlier than 17 days (21 days with a four day grace period) after the first dose.”
While Canada will still require any eligible American traveller entering the country to show a negative test result at the border, Canadian citizens will not be required to show proof of a negative test before crossing into the U.S. via a land or sea port of entry. U.S. air travel rules still require proof of a negative COVID-19 test taken no more than three days before departure.
The spring allergy season has started early in many parts of Canada, with high levels of pollen in some cities already. Experts weigh in on which areas have it worse so far this season.
Premier Doug Ford says that lawsuits launched by four Ontario school boards against a trio of social media platforms are “nonsense” and risk becoming a distraction to the work that really matters.
Multiple flight attendants from Pakistan International Airlines have abandoned their jobs and are believed to have sought asylum in Canada in the past year and a half, a spokesperson for the government-owned airline says.
A New Brunswicker will go to bed Thursday night much richer than he was Wednesday after collecting on a winning lottery ticket he let sit on his bedroom dresser for nearly a year.
Calgary police have shut down a number of bridges into and out of the downtown core as officers deal with a distraught individual.
King Charles III gave public remarks for Maundy Thursday, addressing the importance of acts of friendship, following his and Catherine, Princess of Wales’ cancer diagnoses.
Crypto entrepreneur Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced Thursday to 25 years in prison for a massive fraud that unravelled with the collapse of FTX, once one of the world's most popular platforms for exchanging digital currency.
Peggy is a stout and muscular Staffordshire bull terrier, and Molly is a magpie, an Australian bird best known for swooping on humans during breeding season, not for befriending dogs. But in an emotional video posted online, Peggy’s owners announced that the animals had been separated.
A Toronto restaurant introduced a surprising new rule that reduced the cost of a meal and raised the salaries of staff.
B.C. conservation officers recently seized a nine-foot-long Burmese python from a home in Chilliwack.
A New Brunswicker will go to bed Thursday night much richer than he was Wednesday after collecting on a winning lottery ticket he let sit on his bedroom dresser for nearly a year.
The Ontario government is introducing changes to auto-insurance, but some experts say the move is ill-advised.
A Toronto restaurant introduced a surprising new rule that reduced the cost of a meal and raised the salaries of staff.
Newfoundland’s unique version of the Pine Marten has grown out of its threatened designation.
A Toronto man is out $12,000 after falling victim to a deepfake cryptocurrency scam that appeared to involve Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
It started small with a little pop tab collection to simply raise some money for charity and help someone — but it didn’t take long for word to get out that 10-year-old Jace Weber from Mildmay, Ont. was quickly building up a large supply of aluminum pop tabs.
There’s a group of people in Saskatoon that proudly call themselves dumpster divers, and they’re turning the city’s trash into treasure.
Ontario is facing a larger than anticipated deficit but the Doug Ford government still plans to balance its books before the next provincial election.