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COVID-19

Mask, vaccine mandates for travel defended as government eases border restrictions

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OTTAWA — The government signalled it is aspiring to a “more sustainable” approach to COVID-19 restrictions at the border with several small changes Friday, but public health officials say vaccine and mask mandates remain important.

Unvaccinated children aged five to 11 travelling with a fully vaccinated adult will no longer need a COVID-19 test to enter Canada as of Monday.

Pre-entry tests will still be needed for partially vaccinated or unvaccinated travellers over the age of 12 who are eligible to travel to Canada.

Children under five don’t currently require a COVID-19 test.

Airports will still conduct random mandatory COVID-19 tests on travellers as they arrive, but they will be refocused to four major Canadian airports: Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto and Montreal.

In a news release Friday, government officials announced several other small changes to ease restrictions for international travellers that will take effect after the weekend, “as of part of the Government of Canada’s plans to move toward a more sustainable approach to COVID-19 travel requirements.”

Fully vaccinated travellers, and any kids under 12 with them, will no longer need to provide their quarantine plans when they enter the country.

And when vaccinated people arrive in Canada, they won’t need to wear a mask for 14 days, keep a list of contacts or report COVID-19 symptoms.

The government will also do away with the need for fully vaccinated travellers to quarantine if someone in their group develops COVID-19 symptoms or tests positive.

It’s a good time to ease restrictions at the border, deputy chief public health officer Dr. Howard Njoo said at a briefing in French Friday.

“If people are fully vaccinated, measures can be relaxed,” Njoo said in French.

The minor changes come as particularly good news for people travelling as a family this season, said National Airlines Council of Canada president Suzanne Acton-Gervais.

While Njoo and his chief, Dr. Theresa Tam, said restrictions should be constantly reviewed they also expressed support for the vaccine and mask mandates that are in place.

“I’m not saying anything about it from a policy perspective, but yes, the higher our vaccination rate is, the higher the uptake is of vaccines, the better overall,” Njoo said.

Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos did not appear at the press briefing, but said in a statement that the government would continue to consider further easing of border measures based on science as vaccination levels and health-care system capacity improve.

Airlines in the United States dropped their mask mandates after a Florida judge ruled that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention overstepped its authority in enacting the mandate on public transportation in the first place.

Combined with the fact that many provinces have announced plans to scrap their own mandates, that has prompted some to question whether Canadians should have to mask up on planes and trains.

Tam said if a mandate will encourage people to wear a mask and reduce transmission, why not have one?

“I mean, it has a certain amount of inconvenience perhaps, but it does not essentially restrict travel as such. So I think it’s one of the least intrusive measures, but adds definitely another layer of protection,” Tam said.

Transportation Minister Omar Alghabra says federal and provincial COVID-19 mandates are not out of step with each other at all.

“I actually think the federal rules and provincial rules are almost in sync,” he said at a separate press conference Friday.

“We’ve dropped testing requirements, we’ve dropped quarantine requirements, pre-departure tests. So we’ve really adjusted many of our measures.”

Ontario announced Friday it will extend its mask requirement in high-risk settings until June 11 while it weathers this latest wave of infections.

Tam said COVID-19 is still widespread throughout Canada, and the current wave appeared to be reaching a peak in some parts of the country before the Easter long weekend. It’s too soon to tell if gatherings over that long weekend will result in another bump in cases, she said.

Generally, the number of hospitalizations appears to be manageable during this wave, though some hospitals are suffering as health workers take time off because of COVID-19 infections, she said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 22, 2022.

Laura Osman, The Canadian Press

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Alberta

Medical regulator stops short of revoking license of Alberta doctor skeptic of COVID vaccine

Published on

From LifeSiteNews

By Anthony Murdoch

The Democracy Fund has announced that COVID-skeptic Dr. Roger Hodkinson will retain his medical license after a successful appeal against allegations of ‘unprofessional conduct’ by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta.

A doctor who called for officials to be jailed for being complicit in the “big kill” caused by COVID measures will get to keep his medical license thanks to a ruling by a Canadian medical regulator.

The Democracy Fund (TDF) announced in an April 4 press release that one of its clients, Dr. Roger Hodkinson, will retain his medical license after filing an appeal with the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta (CPSA) over allegations of “unprofessional conduct regarding 17 public statements made in November 2020 and April 2021.”

Hodkinson had routinely argued against the dictates of public health and elected officials and “presented an alternative perspective on COVID-19, including the efficacy of masking and vaccines,” TDF noted.

In 2021, Hodkinson and Dr. Dennis Modry publicly blasted the then-provincial government of Alberta under Premier Jason Kenney for “intimidating” people “into compliance” with COVID-19 lockdowns.

In 2022, Hodkinson said that leaders in Canada and throughout the world have perpetrated the “biggest kill ever in medicine’s history” by coercing people into taking the experimental COVID injections and subjecting them to lengthy lockdowns.

These statements, among others, led the CPSA to claim that Hodkinson had promoted inaccurate or misleading information. “However, following negotiations with lawyers for The Democracy Fund, the CPSA limited its claims to arguing that Dr. Hodkinson’s comments violated the ethical code and extended beyond the scope of a general pathologist.”

Thus, Hodkinson did not “concede that any of his statements were false,” but “acknowledged that his criticisms of other physicians technically breached the Code of Ethics and Professionalism,” the group explained. “He also admitted that he should have clarified that his views were outside the scope of a general pathologist.”

Instead of having his license revoked, TDF stated that Dr. Hodkinson received a “caution” and will have to “complete an online course on influence and advocacy.”

“However, he did not concede that any of his statements were misinformation, nor did the tribunal make such a determination,” noted lawyer Alan Honner.

Some of Hodkinson’s warnings seem to have been vindicated by the current Alberta government under Premier Danielle Smith, who commissioned Dr. Gary Davidson to investigate the previous administration’s handling of COVID-19.

Davidson’s report, which was made public earlier this year, recommended the immediately halt of the experimental jabs for healthy children and teenagers, citing the risks the shots pose.

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COVID-19

5 Stories the Media Buried This Week

Published on

The Vigilant Fox

#5 – Anthony Fauci warns: “The next outbreak will be of a respiratory disease that’s easily transmissible, that has a significant degree of morbidity and mortality.”

“What is likely to happen,” Fauci says, “is the emergence of another respiratory disease.”

“It may be another coronavirus, because we know that coronaviruses, really, mostly in bats, have the capability of binding to receptors that are in humans.”

“It could be another flu,” Fauci continued. “We’re dealing with H5N1 now, which is bird flu, which has taken the somewhat disturbing step of infecting mammals, namely cows and cats and other mammals, which means it’s adapting itself more to a human.”

“So my concern, Walter, is that whenever that happens, the next outbreak will be of a respiratory disease that’s easily transmissible, that has a significant degree of morbidity and mortality,” Fauci said.

When asked if the cuts at HHS and “our attitude towards science” are making the situation “a little bit more dangerous,” Fauci replied, “Oh, absolutely!”

VIDEO: @TheChiefNerd

 

#4 – Dr. Oz drops bombshells on the massive waste, fraud, and abuse bleeding Medicare and Medicaid.

Oz explained that people are unknowingly signed up for coverage, illegal schemes are funneling taxpayer dollars to those who aren’t eligible, and the same patient can be billed in multiple states with no federal oversight catching it.

It also turns out that 230,000 Americans were enrolled in Obamacare plans without even knowing it.

#3 – Tucker Carlson is horrified to learn that over 9 million children have already received the COVID shot—and that the injections are still happening.

His reaction at the end of this clip says it all.

VIDEO: @McCulloughFund

While you’re here, don’t forget to subscribe to get this top 10 list emailed to you each week.

 

#2 – Jenny McCarty reveals chilling encounter after speaking out on vaccine issue.

• After going public about her son’s autism and the vaccine link, Jenny McCarthy received a private visit from a man with a warning.

• He claimed to work for a top-level PR firm and said he was approached by a government agency.

• His job? To create a campaign to discredit her and label her “anti-vaccine.”

• He said he turned down the offer—because his own child had gone through the same thing.

•The man warned her that they would find someone else to do it and use the media to come after her hard.

• McCarthy was stunned and asked him to repeat everything—she said she had chills all over her body.

• When she asked why they’d attack her despite her not being anti-vaccine, he replied, “Doesn’t matter.”

• According to him, they had the media on their side and would do whatever it took to bury her message.

#1 – Billionaire Democrat donor turned DOGE ally drops bombshell and says Biden’s border policies handed $13–15 billion a year to human traffickers—and helped import future Democratic voters.

“We gave $13 to $15 billion a year to human traffickers. That’s what this system did,” Antonio Gracias lamented.

Gracias’ team combed through voter rolls in four states and uncovered thousands of non-citizens not only registered to vote, but in many cases, actually voted.

“We looked at the voter rolls in four states, and we found thousands of these people [non-citizens] on the voter rolls, and we found many of those people had voted. In one state in particular, well over a thousand voted.”

His conclusion?

“I think this [Biden’s border policy] was a move to import voters.”

VIDEO: @KanekoaTheGreat

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