Vaccine distribution and COVID travel rights: In The News for Feb. 8

In The News is a roundup of stories from The Canadian Press designed to kickstart your day. Here is what’s on the radar of our editors for the morning of Feb. 8 …

What we are watching in Canada …

OTTAWA – The Public Health Agency of Canada says Ottawa plans to distribute more than 70,000 Pfizer-BiotNTech vaccine doses this week ahead of a major ramp-up, but no Moderna doses are on the schedule.

The agency says 70,200 Pfizer doses are forecasted for delivery to the provinces and territories for the week starting Feb. 8, followed by about 336,000 and 396,000 doses in the final two weeks of the month.

However, its distribution schedule lists no new Moderna shipments beyond Feb. 7, as confusion over deliveries deflates Canadians’ confidence in the Liberal government’s vaccine rollout.

Maj.-Gen. Dany Fortin, the military commander managing logistics of vaccine delivery for the agency, said Thursday that Canada does not know how many Moderna doses will arrive in the weeks ahead, and the company hasn’t said why it has reduced shipments to Canada.

Pfizer and Moderna are the only two companies to have vaccines approved by Health Canada, though the department is reviewing vaccines from three others: AstraZeneca, Novavax, and Johnson and Johnson.

Weekly projections on vaccine distribution from the public health agency are fluid and subject to change.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has maintained that delivery delays are temporary, and that Pfizer and Moderna tell him Canada is still on track to receive six million doses by the end of March.

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Also this …

OTTAWA – The Canadian Civil Liberties Association is questioning Ottawa’s move to require hotel quarantines for international travellers, saying it may harm lower-income Canadians and infringe on citizens’ mobility rights.

Cara Zwibel, a lawyer who heads the organization’s fundamental freedoms program, is calling on the federal government to produce any evidence that returning passengers are breaching the current requirement to self-isolate at home, which she suggests is the only fair basis to toughen the rules.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced more than two weeks ago that travellers flying back from abroad will have to quarantine at a federally mandated hotel for up to three days at their own expense, though he acknowledged that only a fraction of COVID-19 cases appear to stem from overseas trips.

Zwibel suggests that the cost — $2,000 or more, according to the government — could be prohibitive for lower-income Canadians who need to care for sick relatives or receive specialized medical care abroad.

Health conditions that would make isolating in a hotel particularly challenging are another concern.

In a letter to Canada’s transport minister and attorney general, the civil liberties association is demanding Ottawa carve out quarantine exemptions and fee waivers for Canadians who seek to look after loved ones or receive treatment overseas, particularly people in narrow financial straits.

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And this …

VANCOUVER – Advocates and community leaders say the impacts of COVID-19 on Chinese-Canadians have been magnified by racism aimed at individuals and businesses. 

One year into the pandemic and Amy Go, the president of the Chinese Canadian National Council for Social Justice, says she’s noticed more blatant racist attacks.

Vancouver police reported a surge in anti-Asian hate crime last year, while data from Statistics Canada shows that Canadians with Asian backgrounds were more likely to report noticing increased racial or ethnic harassment during the pandemic.

Go says grocery stores and restaurants owned by Chinese-Canadians have been particularly hurt by the economic downturn as people avoided the businesses weeks before the pandemic shutdowns last March. 

Doris Chow, the co-founder of Project 1907, an Asian advocacy group in Vancouver, says Lunar New Year for Chinese-Canadian businesses is similar to Christmas for other retailers and the shutdowns will again mean reduced sales for this year. 

Justin Kong, the executive director of the Toronto chapter of the Chinese Canadian National Council, says the pandemic has demonstrated the need for more support for front-line workers.

Stats Canada says Chinese-Canadians make up one of the largest groups living in poverty and Kong says his group has been pushing the provincial governments to mandate more paid sick days. 

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What we are watching in the U.S. …

WASHINGTON — Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says the United States is still in a “deep hole” with millions of lost jobs but that President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion relief plan could generate enough growth to restore full employment by next year. 

Republican senators argues that Biden’s proposal is too expensive. 

Meanwhile, House Democrats plan to propose boosting the child tax credit, now at a maximum of $2,000, to as much as $3,600 per child annually. 

That’s according to information obtained The Associated Press. 

The proposal will be part of the COVID-19 relief bill they are writing that is expected to largely follow Biden’s plan.  

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Also this …

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration is set to announce this week that it will reengage with the much-maligned U.N. Human Rights Council that former President Donald Trump withdrew from almost three years ago. 

The decision to join the Geneva-based UNHRC as an observer with an eye toward seeking election as a full member reverses another Trump-era move away from multilateral organizations and agreements. 

U.S. officials say Secretary of State Antony Blinken and a senior U.S. diplomat in Geneva will make the announcement today in a step likely to draw criticism from conservative lawmakers and the pro-Israel community.  

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What we are watching in the rest of the world …

JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has appeared in a Jerusalem courtroom to respond formally to corruption charges as his trial resumes. 

Today’s hearing comes just weeks before national elections in which he hopes to extend his 12-year rule. 

Netanyahu was indicted last year for fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes in three separate cases. 

In recent months, Israelis have held weekly protests calling on him to resign over the charges and criticizing his government’s response to the coronavirus crisis. 

Netanyahu denies any wrongdoing and says he’s the victim of a “witch-hunt” by hostile law enforcement and media.

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Also this …

RUDRAPRAYAG, India — Rescuers in northern India are working to rescue more than three dozen power plant workers trapped in a tunnel after part of a Himalayan glacier broke off and sent a wall of water and debris rushing down the mountain. 

More than 2,000 members of the military, paramilitary groups and police, including sniffer dogs, have been taking part in search-and-rescue operations in the northern state of Uttarakhand after Sunday’s disaster, which has killed at least 18 people, left 165 others missing and damaged dams and homes downstream. 

Officials said the focus Monday was on saving 37 workers who are stuck inside a tunnel at one of the affected hydropower plants. 

Excavators had been brought in the help with the efforts.

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ICYMI …

TAMPA, Fla. — Tom Brady made his seventh Super Bowl title look familiar — despite moving south to a new team and conference during a pandemic. 

Brady threw two touchdown passes to old friend Rob Gronkowski and one to good pal Antonio Brown, and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers beat Patrick Mahomes and Kansas City 31-9 on their home field in Super Bowl 55 on Sunday. 

The Buccaneers won their second NFL title and first in 18 years while becoming the first team to play the big game at home, capping an unusual and challenging season played through the novel coronavirus

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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 8, 2021

The Canadian Press