Indian envoy warns of 'big red line,' days after charges laid in Nijjar case
India's envoy to Canada insists relations between the two countries are positive overall, despite what he describes as 'a lot of noise.'
Pharmacists and health care professionals are asking the public to do their part to mitigate the acetaminophen and ibuprofen shortages being reported across Canada.
Ongoing shortage reports in recent months drew particular attention this week after a SickKids letter to patient caregivers caused some confusion and misunderstanding. Some misinterpreted a prescription recommendation for acetaminophen and ibuprofen in order to ensure access as a requirement instead. No prescription is needed.
“It caught a lot of people off guard,” Barry Power, the editor in chief for the Canadian Pharmacists Association (CPhA), told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview on Thursday.
Power says the majority of the medications are made in Canada, and that the shortage is a demand issue, not the result of any manufacturing problem or a factory being shut down. A Health Canada meeting on Thursday will examine the current situation and explore ways to address the shortage, he added.
With more viruses than usual spreading through communities this summer, along with concerns about a fall spike in COVID-19 infections, the shortage has prompted some people to “stock up,” buying multiple bottles at once. But similar to the run on toilet paper early in the pandemic, hoarding is exacerbating the problem, health experts caution.
“That's the perfect analogy,” Power said, calling it a “domino” shortage and a national issue.
“Also at the beginning of the pandemic, we saw spikes in sales of these products that are used for fever and other common cold products. And then, six months later, nobody was buying them because everybody had already stocked up. That may be the situation that we're seeing now … So really, it's another part of the pandemic that is just making everybody's life difficult.”
The issue should be short term, according to Power, who is a practising pharmacist working virtually. In the meantime, there are things the public can do to help mitigate the current supply crunch.
People are falling behind on their immunization shots, not just for COVID-19, but for other essential vaccines, according to Power.
“There are a lot of viruses circulating among children that can be prevented by vaccines. And a lot of people have fallen behind in the routine vaccine schedules, so if those can be updated, that will d ecrease the demand,” he said.
“Polio has been detected in wastewater in a number of communities around the world. And those are things that we're very concerned about and seeing a resurgence of. A fever is a common symptom of all of these conditions that children often get. Well, let's try and make sure that we can prevent as many as possible.”
Some pharmacies have also taken steps to limit how much a customer can buy in an effort to prevent hoarding. The CPhA has not made a formal recommendation to do so, Power said, noting that it is difficult to monitor, but it is something the association could eventually suggest.
The CPhA did urge the public to not purchase excessive quantities of acetaminophen and ibuprofen in a statement on Wednesday.
“We're in a situation now where it's buy what you need, and leave something behind for somebody else,” Power said.
India's envoy to Canada insists relations between the two countries are positive overall, despite what he describes as 'a lot of noise.'
With Donald Trump sitting just feet away, Stormy Daniels testified Tuesday at the former president's hush money trial about a sexual encounter the porn actor says they had in 2006 that resulted in her being paid to keep silent during the presidential race 10 years later.
The U.S. paused a shipment of bombs to Israel last week over concerns that Israel was approaching a decision on launching a full-scale assault on the southern Gaza city of Rafah against the wishes of the U.S.
Footage from dozens of security cameras in the area of Drake’s Bridle Path mansion could be the key to identifying the suspect responsible for shooting and seriously injuring a security guard outside the rapper’s sprawling home early Tuesday morning, a former Toronto homicide detective says.
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.
Susan Buckner, best known for playing peppy Rydell High School cheerleader Patty Simcox in the 1978 classic movie musical 'Grease,' has died. She was 72.
Accused killer Jeremy Skibicki could have a challenging time convincing a judge that he is not criminally responsible for the deaths of four Indigenous women, a legal analyst says.
A Calgary bylaw requiring businesses to charge a minimum bag fee and only provide single-use items when requested has officially been tossed.
Two Nova Scotia men are dead after a boat they were travelling in sank in the Annapolis River in Granville Centre, N.S., on Monday.
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.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.