'A beautiful soul': Funeral held for baby boy killed in wrong-way crash on Highway 401
A funeral was held on Wednesday for a three-month-old boy who died after being involved in a wrong-way crash on Highway 401 in Whitby last week.
Without clear directive from governments, businesses have to decide whether to make vaccines mandatory for employees and patrons, a decision they say leaves them vulnerable to attacks from anti-vaxxers.
For the first time since 2019, live music will be back at Ottawa's Escapade Festival in September. However, guests must be fully vaccinated to attend.
By making vaccines mandatory, Ali Shafaee, director of the Escapade Music Festival, told CTV National News organizers are trying to protect patrons.
"We're not trying to make this debate on whether someone should get vaccinated or not," Shafaee said. "We're just trying to plan a safe event for 2021 and we feel that this is the best way of doing it."
However, the mandating of doses has become a difficult conversation that more businesses are having to weigh in on as they try to reopen.
Staff at the People's Pint Brewing Company in Toronto voluntarily got vaccinated against COVID-19, posting a proud photo on social media to celebrate the occasion.
While the shots were a choice for staff, the photo was met with negative reviews and online threats from a small but vocal minority of anti-vaxxers.
Doug Appeldoorn, the brewery's owner, said the negative reaction was unexpected.
"That was the hardest thing to kind of combat,” Appeldoorn said.
He recommends other businesses do what they “feel is right” when it comes to making their vaccine status public.
“Don't worry too much about the negativity because even though it's vocal, it is a very small minority of people,” Appeldoorn said. “The vast majority of people support this and will support your business for doing it.”
The brewery was also listed on a website to help guide virus conscious shoppers to stores and restaurants where staff had been vaccinated. The site was met with swift backlash online from anti-vaxxers and was subsequently forced to shut down.
But the criticism also goes the other way.
Last week, an unvaccinated server in Drayton, Ont. said she was targeted and shortchanged on a tip because of her vaccine status.
"The fact that he’s basing my tip off of the vaccination, not on the service provided, is really upsetting to me," server Brooke Rew told CTV Kitchener.
To help navigate the divisive discussion, Ontario's science table recommended the use of vaccine certificates on Wednesday, similar to those already in use in Europe to easily prove one's vaccination status.
Dr. Peter Juni, scientific director of Ontario’s science advisory table, said at a press briefing that proof of vaccines is "inevitable" for the province to return to normal.
"Nobody wants to start to restrict again more. The only way to deal with this is to make a distinction between vaccinated and unvaccinated unfortunately," Juni said.
Should Canada experience a fourth wave of COVID-19 infections, Juni said vaccine certificates would help in keeping the society and the economy open while reducing the risk of contributing to further outbreaks.
"Rather than asking whether vaccines certificates actually should be considered, it's probably more appropriate to ask whether they can be avoided," he said.
A new poll from the Angus Reid Institute reports that nearly 60 per cent of Canadians surveyed believe proof of vaccination should be mandatory in public places including restaurants, shopping malls, theatres and offices.
Despite the controversy, Ottawa-based employment lawyer Paul Champ says rules around vaccinations are fair game.
"There's obviously a lot of competing rights and interests here, but an employer's obligation or their interest here is to maintain a safe and healthy workplace," Champ said.
A funeral was held on Wednesday for a three-month-old boy who died after being involved in a wrong-way crash on Highway 401 in Whitby last week.
There has been a "sophisticated" cybersecurity breach detected on B.C. government networks, Premier David Eby confirmed Wednesday evening.
Toronto police say a man was taken into custody outside Drake's Bridle Path mansion Wednesday afternoon after he tried to gain access to the residence.
U.S. President Joe Biden said for the first time Wednesday he would halt shipments of American weapons to Israel, which he acknowledged have been used to kill civilians in Gaza, if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu orders a major invasion of the city of Rafah.
Dakota Joshua had a goal and two assists and the Vancouver Canucks scored three third-period goals to claw out a 5-4 comeback victory over the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of their second-round playoff series Wednesday.
One of the Indian nationals accused of murdering British Columbia Sikh activist Hardeep Singh Nijjar says in a social media video that he received a Canadian study permit with the help of an Indian immigration consultancy.
Pfizer has agreed to settle more than 10,000 lawsuits about cancer risks related to the now discontinued heartburn drug Zantac, Bloomberg News reported on Wednesday, citing people familiar with the deal.
Quebec Premier Francois Legault is defending his comments about a new history museum after he was accused by a prominent First Nations group of trying to erase their history.
Independent U.S. presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had a parasite in his brain more than a decade ago, but has fully recovered, his campaign said, after the New York Times reported about the ailment.
The stakes have been set for a bet between Vancouver and Edmonton's mayors on who will win Round 2 of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
A grieving mother is hosting a helmet drive in the hopes of protecting children on Manitoba First Nations from a similar tragedy that killed her daughter.
A chicken farmer near Mattawa made an 'eggstraordinary' find Friday morning when she discovered one of her hens laid an egg close to three times the size of an average large chicken egg.
A P.E.I. lighthouse and a New Brunswick river are being honoured in a Canada Post series.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.