The three main party leaders are in Eastern and Central Canada on Wednesday, a day after a new poll suggested the already close race is getting even tighter.
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau gets his day started with a morning announcement in Halifax.
Erin O’Toole of the Conservatives is spending his day in Quebec, starting with a morning announcement in Jonquière, followed by an evening supporter event in Orford.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is in Ontario, first with a morning announcement in Essex on long-term care, then visiting with supporters in a number of communities before taking part in a Twitch stream event in the evening.
On Tuesday, a poll conducted by Leger in collaboration with The Canadian Press indicated the Liberals and Tories are tied with the support of 32 per cent of decided voters ahead of the election on Monday.
A similar poll conducted two weeks ago had the Conservatives ahead with 34 per cent compared with 30 per cent for the Liberals.
The Leger poll suggested New Democrats support was at 20 per cent of decided voters, down from the 24 per cent of respondents from the earlier poll.
To keep education workers, students, and families safe, the Toronto District School Board has announced mandatory vaccine requirements for all staff.
Releasing details Tuesday evening in a release, the TDSB said all employees, trustees, and those who have direct contact with staff and students at its workplace, must be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 by November 1 of this year — adding “subject to approved requests for exemptions under the Human Rights Code.”
In the meantime, it said those who are not vaccinated or have chosen not to disclose their vaccine status must continue to undergo testing and provide a negative result twice a week, and those who do not have a medical or disability exemption will be required to participate in an education session on the benefits of vaccination.
On Tuesday, Toronto Public Health said it’s investigating and contacting tracing at nearly two dozen schools.
The TDSB is collecting vaccination disclosure information from its 40,000 staff members, it said, and around 94 per cent of the staff who have provided that information, which is about 83 per cent, have indicated they have rolled up their sleeves.
Near the end of August, the TDSB said the board provided direction to staff to begin creating a mandatory vaccine procedure.
“This is an important step in the TDSB’s direction to keep students and staff as safe as possible during the pandemic. By requiring staff, Trustees and others to be vaccinated, we reduce the impact that COVID cases have on our classrooms, schools and communities,” TDSB Chair, Alexander Brown, said in a statement.
More research is needed to understand the so-called “long COVID” condition and the burden it poses on the health-care system, a science advisory group said in a report Tuesday.
The Ontario COVID-19 Science Advisory Table, a group that provides guidance to the province on the pandemic, said the post-COVID-19 symptoms affect about 10 per cent of those infected and can last from weeks to months.
“There is under-recognition both for the public but also among clinicians of this condition because it is hard to define and quantify and because we don’t have a lot of information around it,” said Fahad Razak, the lead author of the report.
A conservative estimate suggests about 150,000 Canadians who contract the novel coronavirus experience long COVID-19 symptoms, Razak said. In Ontario, between 57,000 and 78,000 people are affected.
The most common of more than 200 different symptoms include fatigue, shortness of breath, general pain or discomfort, anxiety and depression.
Razak said individuals experiencing such symptoms have difficulty performing daily activities and require increased health-care resources.
“The burden will not only be on the health system, it will also be on other parts of society because a lot of the disabilities are not just about medical care, it’s about the fact that individuals can’t go back to work, it’s that they need a supportive home, it’s difficulty with work and family life,” he added.
The World Health Organization has reported that approximately one in four individuals who were infected with the virus experience symptoms of long COVID for at least one month. Meanwhile, one in 10 people experience symptoms that last beyond 12 weeks.
The Ontario science advisory group said more research is needed on risk factors for long COVID. Vaccination reduces the chance of developing the post-COVID-19 condition, Razak said.
To date, nearly 84.5 per cent of Ontarians over the age of 12 have received one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 78.2 per cent have two doses.
Razak said the latest report from the science advisory group looked at data from the earlier waves of the pandemic and did not take variants of the virus — like Delta and Alpha — into account.
“We don’t have the data yet to know the impact,” he said. “The worry is that those variants are clearly more infectious so we’re potentially running into a problem where we’re going to see even higher rates of the post-COVID condition.”
There is limited Canadian data on health-care use patterns for patients with long COVID, including emergency department visits and hospital admissions, the science group said. A pan-Canadian study is currently being done to examine these patterns for long COVID-19 patients.
Environment Canada’s severe thunderstorm watches and warnings have ended for southern Ontario, including Toronto and the GTA.
Tornado watches were also issued during the evening hours but ended around 10 p.m. Tuesday.
Meteorologist Natasha Ramsahai explains that a cold front in the region has been the trigger, setting off storms north of the GTA, including cottage country, on Tuesday afternoon. The environment was primed for storms in a warm sector, behind a warm front that increased temperatures and humidity through the day.
Once the cloud cleared in the afternoon, heating from the sun added extra energy to get the storms going to the north. This added energy helped to intensify the updrafts and downdrafts within the storms, resulting in very large hail.
Winds at the surface were coming out of a different direction than winds aloft. This was the “shear” needed to add the “twist” to some of these storm cells, resulting in tornado watches and warnings in the evening hours.
As the line of storms sinks south into the GTA through the night, there will be less daytime heating, but they will still pack a punch with rain and wind.
Gusts over 70 to 90 kilometres per hour are possible for the south GTA region and up to 100 kilometres per hour for the north GTA region as they pass through Tuesday night, especially if the line of storms starts to form a “bow echo,” which is a curved line on radar.
There is still a chance for hail in the GTA but it may be smaller than what we saw earlier in the day to the north.
Watch Meteorologist Natasha Ramsahai’s update as of 8:30 p.m. Tuesday night below:
OTTAWA – A new poll shows a complete deadlock between Justin Trudeau’s Liberals and Erin O’Toole’s Conservatives with less than one week left in the federal election.
The poll conducted by Leger in collaboration with The Canadian Press shows both parties tied with the support of 32 per cent of decided voters, with the NDP in third place with 20 per cent.
A similar poll conducted two weeks ago had the Conservatives ahead with 34 per cent compared with 30 per cent for the Liberals and 24 per cent for the NDP.
The polls cannot be given a margin of error because internet-based polls are not considered random samples.
The leaders are back on the campaign trail today after spending yesterday sharpening their attacks, with O’Toole painting his opponent as privileged and entitled — saying while Trudeau was “partying,” he was doing search-and-rescue missions in the military.
Trudeau accused O’Toole of engaging in “personal attacks,” and insisted his own actions could not be compared to the Tory leader’s, even while arguing O’Toole has “proxies” in the anti-vaxxer movement, without providing concrete evidence.
The COVID-19 situation in city schools continues to escalate, with Toronto Public Health now conducting contact tracing investigations at nearly two dozen schools.
TPH says it’s conducting case and contact tracing for COVID-19 at 23 different school buildings.
The schools on that list include East York and West Hill collegiate institutes, Alvin Curling Public School and Milne Valley Middle School.
The number of schools across Ontario affected could be higher.
Data shows 273 confirmed cases in the province, just days into the school year.
This comes as calls grow louder for the Ford government to take immediate action on class sizes to prevent the spread of the virus.
The provincial NDP says class sizes need to be cut immediately amid what Andrea Horvath calls “alarming reports of classroom crowding”
The ministry of education says school boards have the funding and flexibility to choose to re-allocate staffing to meet current class size requirements.
As election day nears closer, we want to know…have you decided who you are voting for? It’s important to know which leader stands for what, and how they compare. Here’s the lowdown on some of the key campaign processes from each political party in Canada.
Remember: this is just a short list of the party platforms! to see the full breakdowns, follow the links below:
https://liberal.ca/our-platform/
https://www.conservative.ca/plan/
https://www.ndp.ca/commitments
https://www.greenparty.ca/en/platform
City of Toronto workers now have until the end of the week to disclose their COVID-19 immunization status.
The City initially set Monday September 13th as the deadline, but a spokesperson says some staff who do not have regular access to computers need additional time.
Under the City’s new mandatory vaccination mandate, all employees who are either unvaccinated or refuse to disclose their status will be required to participate in an information session about the benefits of vaccines.
Employees will then have until September 30th to get at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine and October 30th to be fully vaccinated.
A verdict is expected today in the trial of Linda O’Leary, charged in a boat crash that killed two people in central Ontario two years ago.
O’Leary, the wife of celebrity businessman Kevin O’Leary, has pleaded not guilty to one charge of careless operation of a vessel under the Canada Shipping Act.
Linda O’Leary was at the helm when the boat collided with another vessel on Aug. 24, 2019, on Lake Joseph, north of Toronto.
The couple and a family friend were returning to their cottage from a dinner party at another cottage when the incident took place.
Two people on the other boat — Gary Poltash, 64, of Florida, and Suzana Brito, 48, from Uxbridge, Ont. — died from their injuries. Three others were also hurt.
O’Leary’s defence lawyer, Brian Greenspan, has argued his client should be cleared because there is evidence the other boat’s lights were off at the time of the incident, rendering it essentially “invisible.”
OTTAWA – The three main federal party leaders are focused on Ontario and British Columbia today as the election campaign heads into its final week.
Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau is returning to Vancouver to make an announcement this morning.
Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole, meanwhile, will open the day in the rural Ottawa suburb of Carp.
Later in the day, he’ll hold a pair of virtual town halls with residents of Ontario and B.C. at the Ottawa hotel he’s adopted as his headquarters during the campaign.
The NDP’s Jagmeet Singh, meanwhile, will be in northern Ontario for the second day in a row.
He’ll open the day in the northwestern community of Sioux Lookout before moving on to Neskantaga First Nation.
