British Columbia is introducing new training requirements for commercial truck drivers that the government says will make highways safer.B.C. is the latest province to require mandatory entry-level training (MELT) for commercial drivers, requiring 140 hours of training.It says in a news release the mandatory entry-level training for new Class-1 commercial licence applicants exceeds national requirements.The training for applicants will be required before road tests, beginning October 18th and list of approved training providers will be released by mid-June, the province announced.Lawrence and

British Columbia has set a new record for daily COVID-19 cases and breached the 100,000 mark for total infections both on the same day. Health officials say in a statement that one thousand and 13 cases were confirmed, bringing the total since the pandemic began to 100,048. There are 7,405 active cases, while 304 of those are in hospital, including 80 in intensive care. Three more people have died, bringing the death toll to 1,458. Officials say a delay in sequencing analysis means new cases involving variants of concern identified in the last 24 hours are unavailable. More than 756,000 vacci

Pfizer Canada says it will be asking Health Canada to amend the authorization for its COVID-19 vaccine to extend to children between 12 and 15 years old. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has already been approved for people as young as 16. The initial clinical trials didn't include younger adolescents, but a follow-up trial in 2,260 kids 12 to 15 in the U.S. has been running since the fall. The company released preliminary data from that trial Wednesday, saying none of the kids who got the vaccine developed a COVID-19 infection, compared to 18 infections among the kids who were given a placebo. Ex

The governments of Canada and Ontario say they will help fund construction of a new influenza vaccine manufacturing facility in Toronto.Innovation Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne says the federal government will spend $415 million in the partnership with Sanofi Pasteur Ltd.Champagne says the pandemic has taught all countries that they need to have domestic vaccine manufacturing capacity.Ontario Premier Doug Ford says his government will contribute $55 million to the project.Sanofi will provide more than $455 million as well as create and maintain 1,225 jobs in Canada.The company will als

British Columbia is bumping up its age-based vaccination plan by offering Oxford-AstraZeneca shots to Lower Mainland residents between the ages of 55 and 65. The move comes a day after provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry announced a pause on use of the same vaccine for anyone under 55 on the advice of the National Advisory Committee on Immunization amid concerns about rare blood clots. Dr. Henry says in a news release that officials know from the millions of doses used worldwide that the vaccine is highly effective and the benefits to those over age 55 far outweigh the very real risks

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Pfizer-BioNTech has confirmed it will move up delivery of five million vaccine doses to June from later in the summer. The earlier shipment period will boost the number of Pfizer doses received by the end of that month to 18 million doses. Procurement Minister Anita Anand says the accelerated schedule means Canada will receive about 44 million vaccine doses in total by the end of June, more than enough for every Canadian to receive at least one shot. By the end of this week, Canada will have received about 9.5 million vaccine doses from three manufacturers,

The federal government is expecting around 1.5 million doses of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine from the United States today. The vaccines are expected to arrive by truck and represent the first to come from south of the border. Provincial governments decide on their own how to use a vaccine, but Dr. Howard Njoo, Canada's deputy chief medical officer of health, says all provinces and territories have agreed to suspend the use of the vaccine for those under 55, pending the results of further study. The province's are acting on an advisory committee's concerns about a possible link between the

Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry is banning indoor dining at bars and restaurants and indoor activity at fitness centres for three weeks starting at midnight. Dr. Henry describes the move as a "circuit breaker" amid concerns that more infectious variants are driving "exponential growth" of COVID-19 cases. She says the Whistler Blackcomb ski resort will also be closed until at least April 19th as cases spread in the community. Dr. Henry has also reintroduced restrictions on indoor religious services that she just announced would ease last week. Social activities need to be limited to

Federal immunization experts changed their recommendations for the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. The National Advisory Committee on Immunization says the vaccine should not be used on people under the age of 55. Health Canada is asking AstraZeneca to do a full analysis of the risks of its vaccine across all age groups and genders, following additional reports of patients in Europe developing blood clots. Dr. Supriya Sharma, the chief medical adviser at Health Canada, says there have been no blood clots reported in Canada to date and still believes the vaccine's benefits outweigh the r