COVID-19 Update: 843 new cases, 26 deaths | Two Nenshi staffers went to Hawaii over break | Province addresses vaccine waste concerns
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With news on COVID-19 happening rapidly, we’ve created this page to bring you our latest stories and information on the outbreak in and around Calgary.
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843 new cases, 26 deaths; 26,000 vaccines administered: Shandro
Alberta chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw was joined by Health Minister Tyler Shandro and acting-Municipal Minister Ric McIver for today’s COVID-19 update.
Shandro announced the death of a second continuing care worker, a woman in her 50s who worked in the Edmonton zone.
He also announced that the province has administered over 26,000 vaccines by yesterday and will have administered over 29,000 vaccines by the end of the day Tuesday.
The latest COVID-19 statistics:
You can watch the full update below.
Two members of Nenshi’s staff went to Hawaii over Christmas break Mother angry over travel scandal after Make-A-Wish trip postponed for sick son 
An Alberta mother says she’s outraged by various politicians and staff who decided to travel abroad over the holidays, while a dream trip to Hawaii for her terminally ill son had to be postponed.
Lia Lousier of Airdrie, a bedroom community just north of Calgary, says nine-year-old Braeden is one of 100 people in the world to be diagnosed with a rare inherited connective tissue disease called Hajdu-Cheney syndrome.
Read more .
Calgary’s minor hockey week on hold, golden ring tourney cancelled 
The new year brings new hope for a return to hockey and ringette by thousands of young Calgarians.
Trouble is there’s no sign of good news ahead, with two major events on the city’s minor sports calendar among the casualties of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.
Read more .
‘I just wanted to disconnect’: MLA Tany Yao apologizes for being unreachable in Mexico 
Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo MLA Tany Yao, in a text from Mexico, apologizes for being unreachable while travelling internationally against his own government’s orders, and is returning to Canada.
In the Tuesday text message, Yao said he had just turned on his phone and had been told about Premier Jason Kenney’s orders for all MLAs, cabinet ministers and senior staffers to return to Canada.
Yao unplugged from the world because of a stressful year passing his private member’s bill, which allows private companies to pay Albertans for their blood and plasma. He acknowledged that in hindsight, the trip was a bad idea. Meanwhile, the premier’s office has been trying to reach him since Jan. 1 and tell him to return to Canada.
“I’ve endured abuse and slander in social and mainstream media over my private member’s bill, which they misconstrued,” said Yao. “I just wanted to disconnect and clear my head after this last year.”
Read more .
Province says it’s taking steps to minimize vaccine waste 
Health Minister Tyler Shandro and chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw issued a joint statement this morning in response to reports on social media that vaccine was going unused.
“Early on in planning for immunization, Alberta Health Services was asked to devise a strategy to ensure that the risk of vaccine wastage was minimized. We are also exploring ways to further reduce wastage,” reads the statement, which notes that appointments are purposely overbooked, so that enough health-care workers are always in line.
“If a scenario arises where staff have no booked appointments left but there are thawed doses available, those administering the vaccines are able to vaccinate each other. The vaccine cannot be re-frozen or put in a fridge.”
According to the statement, some vaccine will be lost in any large-scale immunization program. While most vaccination programs see wastage levels of around six per cent, Alberta’s current COVID-19 vaccine wastage level is at 0.3 percent.
“While this is upsetting, it is unavoidable. It is also extremely limited thanks to the processes in place,” reads the statement.
Pandemic sent eating disorder numbers to record highs: SickKids 
The head of SickKids hospital is calling an increase of eating disorders in young people during the pandemic an “unprecedented crisis.”
“Our eating disorder unit has very high numbers that we have never seen before,” says Dr. Ronald Cohn, President and CEO of SickKids in a wide-ranging conversation with the Sun about COVID-19 in children.
Read more .
A quarter of Canadians don’t want the COVID-19 vaccine. We asked the experts why 
The reasons vary and many revolve around the speed with which the vaccines were hurriedly developed and the technology used to make them. According to the data, some 22.3 million Canadians, or about 75 per cent of the population aged 12 or older, indicated they were somewhat likely or very likely to get the COVID-19 vaccine. The data showed that those with higher levels of education had a higher likelihood to want a vaccine.
While the anti-vaccine community is small — estimated at roughly one to three per cent of Canada’s population — it is a vocal one. The WHO says vaccine hesitancy is one of the top risks to global health; if enough people opt to not vaccinate themselves or their children, the WHO says, it can lead to outbreaks of viruses that were previously almost completely eradicated, such as measles.
Read more .
Trudeau says travellers abroad will not be eligible for benefits
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Canada should have a million doses of vaccine by the end of January, and enough to vaccinate every Canadian by the end of September.
That update came during a morning update, where he also took aim at Canadians who chose to travel outside the country, against federal recommendations.
“we’ve made it very clear: no one should be travelling abroad right now,” said the prime minister.
“Let me also be very clear about the Canada Recovery Sickness benefit. It is not intended for travellers who are quarantining when they return from holiday. This program was created to give people sick leave if they needed it and otherwise wouldn’t have one from their employer. It is not there to pay for someone’s post-vacation quarantine.”
Read more .
Full lockdown of Quebec including curfews looms with pandemic out of control: Report 
As health experts warn that the pandemic is out of control in Quebec and hospitalizations for COVID-19 continue to mount, Premier François Legault on Wednesday will announce a province-wide lockdown that will include curfews, La Presse reported on Tuesday.
Quoting sources within the government, the report says the lockdown will go into effect on Saturday, last three to four weeks and extend to schools, offices, construction work and all other activities and commercial operations except for those deemed essential such as food stores and pharmacies.
While Legault was expected to make the announcement on Tuesday, it was delayed for 24 hours in order to meet with representatives of those sectors that will be affected and establish means to execute the lockdown in a coherent manner.
Read more .
Nearly half of Canadians visited friends, family over holidays, new poll suggests 
A new survey suggests nearly half of Canadians visited with family or friends over the winter holiday period.
The Leger/Association for Canadian Studies poll found 48 per cent of those surveyed visited with people outside their households, compared to 52 per cent who said they did not.
Public health officials had pleaded with Canadians to sharply limit their contacts during the holidays to avoid massive spikes in COVID-19 cases.
Read more .
First Alberta health-care worker to die from COVID-19 remembered as kind, caring person 
A long-term care centre in southeast Calgary is mourning the death of a health-care worker who died from COVID-19 as the virus spread there, marking the first death of a health-care worker in Alberta.
Joe (Jing) Corral, a Filipino Canadian who worked at Bethany Riverview long-term care home, died from COVID-19 on Dec. 28 at the age of 61.
Read more .
Vaccine doses are languishing in provincial freezers, with more coming in January 
The federal government has delivered 420,450 doses of COVID vaccine, split between the Pfizer and Moderna candidates, but only 117,768 doses have reached the arms of health-care workers, long-term care residents and other priority groups. The rest is still in storage freezers across the country, according to a report Monday from the COVID-19 Canada Open Data group, a joint project between researchers at the University of Toronto and the University of Guelph.
Read more .
Monday Allard resignation disrupts efforts to mend city-province relations 
Civic leaders in Alberta hoped Tracy Allard would help “reset” their relationship with the province when she became municipal affairs minister.
But just four months into the job, Allard resigned from cabinet Monday after a firestorm over her vacation to Hawaii amid COVID-19 restrictions that kept families apart over Christmas and provincial guidelines that say to avoid “non-essential” travel out of the country.
Read more .
Monday Corbella: Hypocrisy during a pandemic is politically fatal and rightly so 
Columnist Licia Corbella writes:
On Christmas Eve, Lindsey Witzel’s grandfather, Warren Allford, passed away from COVID-19.
For Witzel, not being able to rush to Winnipeg from her Calgary home to hold her beloved 88-year-old Papa’s hand as he lay dying was, as she said during an interview, the “hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.”
Not only could she not be by his side, but because of Alberta government COVID-19 restrictions, she couldn’t comfort her grandma, Gloria, who lost her husband of 67 years. What’s more government restrictions also make it illegal for her to drive the five minutes down Deerfoot Trail from her McKenzie Towne home to Auburn Bay to comfort her parents, particularly her father Guy Allford on the passing of his beloved dad.
In other words, Witzel did what most Albertans are doing — that is she’s following the legally binding restrictions put in place by Premier Jason Kenney’s UCP government.
Read more .
Monday Braid: Kenney fires and demotes to spike scandal, but Albertans will decide if they forgive 
Columnist Don Braid writes:
In the UCP government, they’re calling it “Bloody Monday,” the demotion of a top official and six prominent MLAs, including a rising full minister, for wayward travels during the holiday period.
Premier Jason Kenney hopes to erase the stain promptly and decisively. But everybody with a pet knows about stains. The episode will be a shadow on his regime for a long time.
Read more .
Monday 1,128 new cases reported; 96 deaths since Dec. 30