Canadian COVID-19 News

[Eder]

Yes...our Canadian government was pretty scatter brained before Covid but now they are completely deranged. Canadians love it & most likely will vote these guys back in. We get what we deserve.

[Mike OReilly]

Originally Posted by Knot Safety

...What is the purpose of this approach? It does nothing but optics

Agreed. But in politics, and indeed in life, optics aren't nothing.

[Pelagic]

Originally Posted by Mike OReilly

Agreed. But in politics, and indeed in life, optics aren't nothing.

Better than a double negative[emoji6]

[Mike OReilly]

Originally Posted by Pelagic

Better than a double negative[emoji6]

[GordMay]

Health Canada approves use of AstraZeneca-Oxford vaccine.

[Mike OReilly]

CBC News:

Science will lead the way on border reopening, U.S. secretary of state says

[nwdiver]

Originally Posted by Eder

Yes...our Canadian government was pretty scatter brained before Covid but now they are completely deranged. Canadians love it & most likely will vote these guys back in. We get what we deserve.

The problem is, there is no alternative.....besides my MP is the Independent 😉

[TrentePieds]

Yeh for Auntie Jodi :-)!

TP

[LifePart2]

Originally Posted by Knot Safety

The current hotel quarantine for people flying in is a farce and just an election gimmick. Keep an open mind and consider:

Everyone flying in has to have a COVID test prior to arrival. That is good

On arrival, everyone has another covid test. Also good.

So we know everyone flying in is clean (or super high likelihood, unless they picked it up on the plane or airport). Yet we go make them stay in a hotel for three days at $2000.

Now, if you are in Canada and test for Covid, and are positive, you are sent home to isolate with your family! And the family does not have to quarantine.

End result - when we have testing that shows you are negative, you go stay in a hotel. But when it shows you are positive, you go stay with other people.

What is the purpose of this approach? It does nothing but optics

And don’t even get me going on banning Canadian airlines from Mexico and the Caribbean and still allowing other companies from other countries to serve those routes. Banning Canadian carriers from doing that just cedes market share to American companies. Supposedly it’s all about stopping the variants, but no companies are banned from flying where the variants started. Hmmmmm. This whole thing stinks

Ah, but you are forgetting that there is about a 1% false positive rate on the PCR tests that no one ever mentions. That means that on a flight of 200 people (all of whom have tested negative 72 hours ago) there will be maybe 2 positive test when they arrive in Canada and get re-tested. So now we have two 'cases' just arrived, which then justifies the panic about all these flights bringing in the virus.

Sheer lunacy.

And banning travel to the Caribbean where there are virtually NO cases, while still allowing travel to Europe and UK?

Double lunacy.

Who comes up with these hair-brained ideas? But at least he does have a nice haircut

[Paul L]

Originally Posted by LifePart2

Ah, but you are forgetting that there is about a 1% false positive rate on the PCR tests that no one ever mentions. That means that on a flight of 200 people (all of whom have tested negative 72 hours ago) there will be maybe 2 positive test when they arrive in Canada and get re-tested. So now we have two 'cases' just arrived, which then justifies the panic about all these flights bringing in the virus.

Sheer lunacy.

...:

Pretty lame argument if you aren't going to include the number of false negatives too.

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by LifePart2

... And banning travel to the Caribbean where there are virtually NO cases, while still allowing travel to Europe and UK? ...

From whence do you come by that notion?

Tracking COVID-19 in the ECCU* [as of February 26/21]:
➥ https://www.eccb-centralbank.org/p/t...19-in-the-eccu

* ECCU Members: Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Commonwealth of Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, St Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and St Vincent and the Grenadines

[LifePart2]

Originally Posted by Paul L

Pretty lame argument if you aren't going to include the number of false negatives too.

Any individual hoping to get on a plane has a risk of being true positive. That risk is equal to the current prevalence of the disease. In almost every country that is under 3%. So, of a 1,000,000 people wanting to fly, 30,000 are infected. They then get a PCR test. Onbly those testing negative get to fly. The false negative might be 1%. So of those 30,000 300 will be false negative, ie they will be infected but look like they are not. They will get to fly when they shouldn't. At the same time, of the 970,000 that tested negative, 9,700 will be false positives who then don't get to fly.

So putting that together, there will be 970,300 people who get to fly, of which 0.03% who will be false negative.

We then test them when they get off the plane.

To bring that back to the airplane with 200 passengers, this will produce 2 false positive, 0.06 true positives (the false ones who now get picked up) and 0.0006 new false negative.

Now suppose we test them again after a few more days. The two false positives will get cleared (but will have to spend 2 weeks in quarantine) wihle 1% of the 199.94 people who are true negatives will be false positive, ie another 2 people who will now be required to sit in a quarantine they don't need.

But now the polititians can point to FOUR people coming on the plane where were active 'cases' (no, they are not), thus justifying their hysteria.

And the new batch of false negatives? Well, there were only 0.06 people on the plane who were hidden positives. Of those, 1% ie 0.0006 will test false negative again. So the chances of them slipping through into the community undetected are miniscule.

If we then test them again, we get yet another batch of false positives, and so the problem gets compounded each time.

The false negative rate only becomes important when the background prevalence itself becomes significant.

Noel

[Macblaze]

This thread has got along quite well avoiding the political outcomes of covid policies so I will refrain (mostly) from commenting on this recent batch of commenters. Suffice it to say a bunch of you would really really dislike the border policies I would institute if anyone was ever dumb enough to elect me PM.

On the good side, the latest statement says 20M vaccinated by Canada Day for whatever that's worth—I'm going to be positive and guess that is low-balled. The question for me remains: so what? I haven't really seen any credible picture of what a post-vaccination world will look like, but hopefully it involves me getting to my boat in BC and Mike getting to his in NFLD.

PS Mike I saw a presentation on cruising the south coast of NFLD at the Virtual Vancouver Boat Show. It's bumped up a few more notches on bucket list now—what an experience!

[Mike OReilly]

Originally Posted by Macblaze

On the good side, the latest statement says 20M vaccinated by Canada Day for whatever that's worth—I'm going to be positive and guess that is low-balled. The question for me remains: so what? I haven't really seen any credible picture of what a post-vaccination world will look like, but hopefully it involves me getting to my boat in BC and Mike getting to his in NFLD.

Here's hoping, for both our sakes . Personally I don't expect Newfoundland to open up soon enough for us to have a cruising season this year. I can't see them lifting the blockades till almost everyone is vaccinated, which still won't be till into September according to our illustrious leader.

Originally Posted by Macblaze

PS Mike I saw a presentation on cruising the south coast of NFLD at the Virtual Vancouver Boat Show. It's bumped up a few more notches on bucket list now—what an experience!

Was that the one by Mike & Jayne? They have their boat in the same marina as mine (Lewisporte), and have become new friends. I tuned into their presentation at the Toronto virtual show -- just to remind me of what used to be... .

Not trying to compete with their show, but if you need more enticements, I've got a few photos and vids from our recent (2019) journey around the northern peninsula:

August 2019 – CLAFC – Creativity, Learning, Adventure, Freedom & Cessation

[sv_pelagia]

Originally Posted by Macblaze

I haven't really seen any credible picture of what a post-vaccination world will look like, but hopefully it involves me getting to my boat in BC and Mike getting to his in NFLD.

Can't speak for NFLD - - sorry Mike - - but nothing has prevented you from coming to your boat in BC (assuming you are anywhere in Canada).

Many here in BC would like BC to somehow institute formal travel restrictions into the Province, but this hasn't happened and it's highly unlikey it will (Bonnie Henry and Gov see it as unworkable and possibly unconstitutional, the former reason being the most recent.)

So, maybe we'll see you on the water this summer