The latest news on COVID-19 developments in Canada (all times Eastern):
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1:50 p.m.
Yukon’s chief medical officer of health says the territory is considering a child-friendly, made-in-British Columbia test for COVID-19.
The test does not involve a swab up the nose and instead allows kids to rinse with a small amount of saline solution and spit it into a vial.
The saliva is then tested for the novel coronavirus, and Dr. Brendan Hanley says the results have been promising and B.C. is sharing the technology.
With the possibility of more children being tested for COVID-19 this fall and winter, Hanley says the B.C. test is much less invasive and could alleviate parents’ concerns about having their youngsters undergo the swab test.
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1:27 p.m.
Quebec’s health minister is urging people to minimize non-essential gatherings in the coming weeks in an attempt to put the brakes on the second wave of COVID-19 in the province.
Christian Dube says the contagion is being driven by community transmission at events such as family gatherings, private parties, funerals and weddings.
He’s asking all Quebecers — regardless of the COVID-19 situation in their region — to keep contacts to a minimum.
Dube warns that Quebec could “hit a wall” if efforts aren’t taken to reduce the rising number of infections.
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1:10 p.m.
Ontario Premier Doug Ford says the province has to be more strategic about who receives a COVID-19 test, which is why health officials are now telling most asymptomatic individuals not to go to an assessment centre.
Ford says Ontario needs to target people with symptoms or those who have come into contact with a case.
He says low-risk asymptomatic individuals can still make an appointment at up to 60 pharmacies across the province to get tested.
The change comes after months of the government telling people that anyone who wants a test should get one.
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12:45 p.m.
New Brunswick is reporting two new cases of COVID-19.
Health authorities say one of them is a person in their 40s from Fredericton who got infected while travelling in Ontario and is now recovering there.
The second case involves a person in their 60s from the Moncton area who had travelled outside the Atlantic region and is now in isolation in New Brunswick.
Also, the province reports that a resident of Quebec who works in the Campbellton, N.B., region has tested positive and is in isolation in Quebec.
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12:30 p.m.
Quebec’s ombudswoman says nothing was done to resolve well-known problems in the long-term care network before the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
Marie Rinfret’s annual report released today notes that while responding perfectly to an unprecedented event such as COVID-19 would’ve been impossible, the Health Department had been forewarned about the major problems.
She says understaffing, employee burnout, lack of qualified workers and dilapidated premises were all known to successive provincial governments.
Rinfret notes the situation faced in elder-care homes was repeatedly condemned in previous years, but says solutions that could have improved conditions in those facilities were often postponed.
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11:15 a.m.
Quebec is reporting 582 new cases of COVID-19 and one additional death linked to the virus today.
The province’s Health Department says no deaths were reported in the past 24 hours, but one death from last week has been added to the provincial total.
Quebec has been the province hit hardest by the COVID-19 pandemic, with 69,670 cases and 5,810 deaths.
The number of people hospitalized with the virus increased by six to 184, of whom 31 are in intensive care.
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10:30 a.m.
Ontario is reporting another 409 cases of COVID-19 and one new death related to the virus.
Health Minister Christine Elliott says 63 per cent of those cases are in people under the age of 40.
The province is now reporting a total of 48,496 cases of the coronavirus, which includes 2,836 deaths and 41,886 cases marked as resolved.
The Ministry of Health says 286 cases were newly marked as resolved in today’s report.
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The Canadian Press
