COVID-19 immunization clinic setting up. Photo: Nova Scotia Government
Nova Scotians at the highest risk for severe illness from Covid-19 can now book their spring dose.
The booster will be available from March 25 to May 31.
The groups eligible to book right now are those 65 or older, people 18 or over in long-term care, nursing homes or residential care facilities; people who are moderately or severely immunocompromised and those 50 or older who are indigenous or black.
Dr. Robert Strang said in a news release that cases are steady in Nova Scotia. But he urged people at the highest risk of infection to get their spring booster.
People who did not get a dose in the fall or winter can get the spring dose, even if they are not part of the specific groups mentioned.
Queens County residents who haven’t received their latest COVID booster or influenza vaccine will get another shot at it on Tuesday.
Nova Scotia Health is organizing a COVID-19 and influenza immunization clinic at Queens Place Emera Centre on Jan. 9, from 11:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The public health mobile unit will be offering the following vaccines: COVID-19 Moderna XBB.1.5, the influenza vaccine for people from 6 months to 64 years old and the high-dose influenza shot for those 65 and over.
Officials are encouraging people to book their appointments ahead of time, though some limited drop-ins may be available.
COVID-19 rapid test kits will also be available.
According to Nova Scotia’s online vaccine booking page, the next available appointments in the Liverpool area after Tuesday are on Jan. 16.
Public Health officials have urged Nova Scotians to make sure they are up to date on their vaccinations, as COVID-19 and other respiratory viruses are still hospitalizing people across the country.
Dr. Robert Strang speaks at COVID briefing February 23, 2022. Photo Communications Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia has announced the availability of new COVID-19 and influenza vaccines.
Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Robert Strang provided details about the rollout at a press conference Tuesday.
Nova Scotians aged 65 and older can get the high-dose influenza vaccine now. All Nova Scotians will have access to Moderna’s updated COVID-19 vaccine during the week of October 16. The standard-dose influenza vaccine is arriving in the province the week of October 23 and Pfizer’s updated COVID-19 vaccine will be available sometime in late October or early November.
The high-dose flu vaccine will be available at local pharmacies and medical clinics across the province starting this week.
Strang emphasized the importance of vaccination, stating, “This fall, we encourage everyone to roll up their sleeves and get both recommended vaccines to protect their health. It’s the best way to limit the spread of both influenza and COVID-19.”
The province is advising Nova Scotians that they can receive both flu and COVID vaccines at the same time. Anyone wishing to receive a vaccine can do so at a nearby pharmacy or outreach clinic by signing up online at Nova Scotia Immunization. Alternatively, people can book their shots through their family doctors or nurse practitioners.
Nova Scotia Health is reminding people that vaccines do not cause influenza or COVID-19 and that symptoms for both illnesses can overlap, including fever, headache, and fatigue.
Anyone who has already received their primary series of COVID-19 vaccines are eligible for an updated dose if six months have passed since their last vaccination or known COVID-19 infection. And officials are recommending children aged six months to nine years should receive two doses of the influenza vaccine four weeks apart this fall if they have never been vaccinated before.
Health authorities are urging all Nova Scotians to prioritize their health by getting vaccinated against both influenza and COVID-19 to protect themselves, their loved ones, and their communities.
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Nova Scotia Health is reminding people that COVID-19, influenza, and RSV are still active and must be considered when visiting loved ones this holiday season.
In a release, they say masks must be worn at all times in all provincial health facilities and the number of visitors patients can have will depend on where they are being treated and what they are being treated for.
Only people identified by a patient as an essential care partner (support person, caregiver) can visit a patient in hospital.
Only one Essential Care Partner/ Support Person at a time for:
children and youth under 19 in outpatient settings
hospital inpatients
patients in emergency departments
prenatal visits, including ultrasounds
ambulatory care clinics, appointments, or procedures
patients with COVID-19 infection (additional measures may be required)
Two Essential Care Partners/ Support Persons at a time for:
children and youth under 19 admitted to hospital, or having day surgery
patients in intensive care units and critically ill patients in emergency departments
patients in labour and giving birth
Three Essential Care Partners/Support Persons at a time for:
palliative care and other patients nearing end of life
patients receiving medical assistance in dying (MAiD)
In a release, Nova Scotia Health says people with compromised immune systems are relying on the facilities to ensure a safe and healthy place in which to receive treatment, rest and recover.
And that health care workers take precautions every day to prevent getting sick or passing illness onto patients.
Nova Scotia Health asks when visiting loved ones under provincial care this holiday season to bear in mind that general masking requirements create a healthier environment, reducing the strain on care teams, and the health care system as a whole.
Liverpool Regional High School. Photo credit Ed Halverson
Supporters of Liverpool Regional High School graduates will continue to do so online this year.
For close to 25 years, organizers have held a dinner and auction to raise money for the LRHS scholarship fund.
Each year, the fund distributes around 20 $1,000 awards to roughly a third of the graduating class in support of their post-secondary schooling.
Fundraising efforts moved to an online auction when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, cancelling the in-person dinner.
Fundraising committee member Kim McPhail says uncertainty surrounding how lifting COVID restrictions would impact the live event made staying online the most viable option this year.
“We just kind of had to say, okay, we don’t know what’s going to happen in the future. We’re going to have to do the online one to make sure that we can provide the kids with the best option we can,” said McPhail.
Instead of serving patrons dinner as they normally would, 40 student volunteers are headed into the community to ask residents and businesses to donate items to be auctioned off.
So far, those items include donations of everything from gift certificates to a load of gravel ranging in value from $25 up to $500.
McPhail doesn’t know how many items will be up for auction as donations are still pouring in but says bidding opens for each item in a block at 8:00am and closes at 8:00pm three days later.
She says the auction will end May 31 so the money raised can be turned over to the LRHS Scholarship Foundation by June 1.
McPhail says the group has set a goal of raising $22,000 this year.
“It’s a big goal but we do have a lot of community support.”
Since the auction began 24 years ago, the LRHS Foundation has awarded almost half a million dollars to over 400 students.
Parents are upset schools are not telling them about COVID in classrooms.
As public health moves away from contact tracing, parents must rely on each other to find out if their kids have been exposed in schools.
One of those parents is Matthew Verge whose two stepchildren aged seven and eight attend Centre Scolaire du la Rive Sud in Cookville.
Verge became concerned when he learned one of his children’s close friends contracted COVID but no one from the school let his family know.
“We not only didn’t receive a notification that there was a case,” said Verge. “We didn’t receive a notification that we wouldn’t be receiving notifications.”
Verge says the school community is tight and parents do a good job of informing each other what is happening in classes but argues it shouldn’t be up to parents to contact each other about a potentially serious illness.
“I think it’s doubtful that a parent would end up just simply not knowing that there was a COVID case because there’s such a strong network. But that said, it’s not their responsibility,” said Verge. “And frankly, you could be the most involved parent that you could possibly be and you still wouldn’t have every contact information of every person.”
Verge’s concern is echoed across Nova Scotia.
Stacey Rudderham speaks for Nova Scotia Parents for Public Education, a Facebook group of over 20,000 parents from all over the province.
Her members are angry that school administrators are ordered not to share information about COVID cases in their schools with parents.
Rudderham understands the need to protect people’s privacy but says if a parent is willing to come forward and reveal their child has COVID to prevent classmates from contracting or spreading the virus, school officials should be allowed to get that message out to other parents.
“The message would be clear and it would be correct and people would feel like they were being informed. That’s the big thing,” said Rudderham. “We know from lots of experience that parents just; they want to be informed.”
Verge says that information is important for families to have when dealing with immunocompromised relatives.
“Do we not send them to school, do they never see their grandmother, do we risk the kids getting COVID themselves? Supposedly it’s okay with kids, but it’s not always. I don’t see why it’s such a big deal to just tell us,” said Verge.
No one from Public Health or the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development replied for a request to comment on whether the policy preventing administrators from contacting parents would be reviewed.
Dr. Robert Strang. Photo Communications Nova Scotia
The province’s top doctor says staff and students are welcome to share their COVID status, but schools won’t aid in getting the word out.
Dr. Robert Strang says the omicron variant is so widespread that there is little value in providing contract tracing.
“The risks of relying on being notified and then the false assumption that if you’re not notified, you’re somehow not at risk just don’t work anymore with the widespread of omicron,” said Strang.
While he recognizes the change is a significant psychological shift that will cause anxiety for some staff and parents, Strang says previous attempts at contact tracing have shown they may cause more harm than good.
“What we learned when we were doing this close contact tracing in November and December, particularly, was that doing that close contact tracing and then the subsequent isolation of people who were identified classroom contacts was incredibly disruptive to our school system and to families. So, we’re not going to be isolating people anymore.”
During Wednesday’s COVID briefing, Strang was asked why school officials have been told they are not permitted to share COVID cases.
Strang says it’s up to individual parents and teachers if they want to share their own personal information and schools would not distribute that information to protect the privacy of the people involved.
But he insisted reports of school officials being told not to share information is untrue.
“In fact, that is misinformation that’s been put out there by various groups that there’s somehow a ban or a gag order. That’s not true,” said Strang. “However, the school system and individual teachers need to be aware that there’s legislation that governs how somebody else’s personal health information is actually disclosed.”
Strang was provided with a copy of a letter issued to parents by a principal in which the principal says they have been specifically told they are not permitted to share COVID information with the school community.
Strang responded that is not the message that has come out of discussions he has had with education officials over the past few days.
“That has been clarified and that is not actually the appropriate phrasing and language that has been most recently shared with school administration.”
How the message has been clarified was not identified as the update was cut off abruptly following Dr. Strang’s response.
A series of follow up correspondence with the South Shore Regional Centre for Education, the Department of Education and Early Childhood Development and the Department of Health and Wellness all confirm the information provided by the principal was accurate.
The official policy from the education department echoes earlier comments from Dr. Strang that teachers and parents are free to share their own personal COVID information if they choose, but school administration will not make that information public.
The latest COVID numbers from public health show three more Nova Scotians have died, 11 people have been admitted to hospital and five have been discharged.
Strang says while public health is moving away from rigorous contact tracing, how people prevent the spread of COVID-19 remains the same.“The message for everybody is get vaccinated, follow all the personal protective measures, especially and if you’re sick with new cold and flu-like symptoms stay home,” said Strang. “That message doesn’t change just because somebody has been a close contact.”
Public health officials are asking Nova Scotians to change their COVID-19 testing habits.
At Wednesday’s COVID-19 briefing, Premier Tim Houston acknowledged Nova Scotian’s commitment to testing is the envy of public health officials across the country.
“To be totally honest, I’ve been a regular for months at either stopping at a clinic for a PCR or a rapid test at home. It’s always been something I’ve been doing during the pandemic, and it’s always provided a great deal of comfort. So, I get it,” said Houston. “I get that the change is difficult, but we have to start moving away from the way we’ve been testing.”
Houston says approximately 830,000 tests are distributed across Nova Scotia each week.
The province has ordered 2 million tests above the amount they receive from the federal government, but like the rest of the provinces they’re waiting on supply to arrive.
The province’s chief medical officer of health Dr. Robert Strang says before anyone can get a PCR or rapid test, they need to do the self-assessment online.
“This is the reality of dealing with limited supply and while you may not be happy about this, we all need you to understand and accept that others may need to be a higher priority than ourselves,” said Strang. “ Please do not get angry at frontline staff or try and find a workaround. Put others ahead of yourself and be kind to those who have been caring for you for over the past two years. They deserve nothing less than this.”
Public health announced 12 new hospital admissions and seven discharges Wednesday.
They also reported a woman in her 60s from the Western Zone has died.
Strang says Nova Scotians should be confident that vaccines are working.
While people are still dying from the virus, Strang says vaccines are preventing serious illness in most.
In a release, Nova Scotia Health said there are currently 600 staff and physicians off work due to COVID-19 infections, or self-isolate requirements.
As a result, only urgent and emergent surgeries, including time sensitive cancer surgeries, will be performed at this time
Strang says the omicron virus has seriously impacted the ability of hospitals to maintain staffing levels.
“There’s no doubt we are in a very serious situation. The most serious we’ve been in during this entire pandemic, given all the pressures on our health care system,” said Strang. “This is different than other waves. We’ve never before had hundreds of healthcare workers not able to work or so many cases that public health is no longer able to identify and closely manage each case and all their contacts.”
Strang urges everyone to reduce their contacts and follow the masking and social distancing requirements to keep themselves and the people around them safe.
Christmas holidays are over for students across Nova Scotia as they return to online classes Monday.
The measures will last a week, giving schools and public health officials time to prepare the buildings, students, and staff for a safe return during the omicron outbreak.
Regional Director at South Shore Regional Centre for Education Paul Ash says the move to online learning will be very familiar to the school community.
“This isn’t new territory for us. We’ve learned a lot over the last two years in terms of online learning and other ways of engaging our students when they’re not in classrooms,” said Ash. “Obviously, we still believe that schools are safe and they’re the best place for our students to be.”
Getting fresh air into classrooms in some schools across the province has been a struggle.
Some buildings do not have mechanical ventilation systems and must rely on natural ventilation, in other words, opening a window.
North Queens Community School in Caledonia is one of eight schools across the region which will install HEPA filters to improve the air quality.
The province has also said 3-ply masks will be made available to students upon their return to in-class learning.
Ash says students and staff in this region have always had access to three-ply masks.
“Those are the masks that are available to our students in our schools right now. At the outset [we] made sure we had more than enough masks available. We have masks available, and they continue to be available to any students and staff that would like those,” said Ash.
SSRCE Executive Director Paul Ash. Photo Ed Halverson
The province also announced test kits will be distributed to schools once they’ve been received from the federal government.
Parents have raised concerns about communication from the schools, in particular, how they will be notified if a classmate has contracted COVID.
Ash says schools will follow the lead of public health regarding how and when those notifications will be made.
“So, we’re part of a mechanism. We don’t make those decisions and I’d be a little concerned being the person to say this is what I think they should do when really, they’ve done such a great job,” said Ash. “Our role is to implement the directives, not actually to create those. So, we’re part of those conversations but at the end of the day, we take the advice of public health and implement as directed.”
He says discussions will take place with public health over the next week so students, staff and parents will know exactly how they are to be notified of COVID cases in schools.
Ash praised families and staff for their hard work and sacrifice to keep COVID cases in regional schools low since the start of the pandemic.
“I do want to thank members of the community in South Shore for their fantastic work over the last couple of years that has allowed us to continue to work with our students in such a positive way.”
Astor Theatre, Liverpool, Nova Scotia. Photo Credit: Ed Halverson
Astor Theatre management was hoping for a better start to 2022.
The popular Liverpool theatre has been effectively closed since the province announced restrictions just before Christmas to limit the spread of the omicron variant.
General Manager Jean Robinson-Dexter says safety measures such as checking for vaccination, masking, and having ushers escort patrons directly to their seats encouraged a good turnout at many of the shows before they were shut down.
“People told us that they felt safe, they felt welcome and so we will just continue to do that once we’re able to welcome folks back here,” said Robinson-Dexter.
The province announced those restrictions have been extended until the end of January and Robinson-Dexter is still unsure what will happen after that.
She’s been reaching out to promoters and performers scheduled to play in February to decide if they will go ahead with their dates with the risk of more potential restrictions cancelling those shows as well.
“We’re just, kind of in wait and see, hoping that we can reopen and I’m not expecting that it’s going to be at full capacity for a while.”
Astor theatre interior. Photo Ed Halverson
Opening for 50 to 100 people is not economically viable for the theatre or performers according to Robinson-Dexter.
She hopes the community understands that leaves the theatre in a precarious position.
The Astor receives annual grants to help cover some of the operating costs and the federal and provincial governments have come forward with more money to help the theatre weather the pandemic.
But it takes funding from multiple sources, including fundraising and ticket sales to keep the Astor afloat.
Robinson-Dexter says the theatre has just wrapped its annual December donation campaign, but she hasn’t seen the totals yet.
She looks forward to reopening the Astor as soon pandemic conditions permit because the theatre is more to the community than entertainment.
“And it’s so important for people, both, I think, for social connection, to get folks out in the community, seeing friends again, and just for their mental health and well-being,” said Robinson-Dexter. “Music can fill you up.”
