Good evening, these are the top coronavirus headlines tonight:
Top headlines:
- Two Chinese cities ease COVID-19 restrictions after anti-lockdown protests spread across country
- Doctors urge parents to get routine vaccines for kids following pandemic disruptions
- Twitter ends enforcement of COVID-19 misinformation policy
An increasing number of health agencies have changed how they're reporting data on the coronavirus. A look at the current numbers in Canada for reported cases, deaths from COVID-19 and for hospitalizations can be found here.
COVID-19 updates from Canada and the world
- The Chinese cities of Guangzhou and Chongqing announced an easing of COVID curbs on Wednesday, a day after demonstrators in southern Guangzhou clashed with police. Protests against China’s stringent “zero-COVID” policies flared in cities over the weekend, in the largest and most sustained show of defiance to Beijing’s rules since the pandemic began.
- Western University says it will no longer require students, staff and visitors to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
- Twitter will no longer enforce its policy against COVID-19 misinformation, raising concerns among public health experts that the change could have serious consequences.
- Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is reversing a promise to enshrine human rights protections for the COVID-19 unvaccinated in law this fall. Meanwhile, an Alberta legislature member who admitted to hacking the province’s COVID-19 vaccine records portal has been ordered to pay a $7,200 fine.
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Pandemic recovery
- China’s manufacturing and services activities shrank further in November to seven-month lows, official data showed, stung by the country’s strict COVID-19 restrictions and rising infections that analysts said will hurt the economy well into 2023.
- The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has pulled its emergency authorization of a COVID-19 antibody co-developed by Eli Lilly & Co. and Vancouver’s AbCellera Biologics Inc. after determining the drug is not expected to neutralize the two latest subvariants of the virus.
- Pediatricians are urging parents to get their kids routine vaccines for preventable diseases like measles following a drop in vaccinations during the pandemic.
- The number of people in Europe with undiagnosed HIV has risen as testing rates fell during the pandemic, according to a joint report from the World Health Organization and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control.
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Globe opinion
Samir Sinha: Canada’s health care systems must do more to protect at-risk people from the flu
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Information centre
- Everything you need to know about Canada’s travel rules for vaccinated and unvaccinated people
- When will COVID-19 be endemic? The four factors that will shape the virus’s future
- Wastewater is filling the COVID-19 data gap
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Samantha Edwards