By David Ljunggren
OTTAWA, Could 21 (Reuters) – Canada has prolonged its ban on passenger flights from India and Pakistan by 30 days to June 21 as a part of a marketing campaign to combat COVID-19, Transport Minister Omar Alghabra stated on Friday.
Alghabra stated Canada had seen “a big discount” in coronavirus infections amongst arriving airline passengers since Ottawa first introduced the bans on April 22 because the variety of circumstances in India soared. The transfer doesn’t have an effect on cargo flights.
“These ongoing measures will stay in place to assist defend Canadians and to handle the elevated danger of imported circumstances of COVID-19 and variants of concern,” he informed a briefing.
As vaccinations decide up throughout Canada, the variety of each day new circumstances has dropped by 25% since final week and it now averages round 5,000, deputy chief public well being officer Howard Njoo informed the briefing.
Canada has to this point recorded a complete of 25,111 deaths from COVID-19 and greater than 1.three million circumstances general.
The ban on Indian and Pakistani flights is a part of a collection of restrictions Canada has imposed to decrease the transmission of the virus, together with curbs on non-essential journey throughout the lengthy land border with the USA.
Canada stated on Thursday that the measure, first utilized in March 2020, can be prolonged by one other month to June 21. Authorities officers stated they have been in no hurry to open up journey throughout the border, citing the necessity to defend public well being. .
Ontario, essentially the most populous of the 10 provinces, introduced on Friday that it might start administering second doses of AstraZeneca Inc’s AZN.L COVID-19 vaccine after earlier halting roll out resulting from issues about uncommon blood clots.
The province has tens of 1000’s of AstraZeneca doses set to run out on the finish of Could.
(Reporting by David Ljunggren in Ottawa and Moira Warburton in Toronto; modifying by Grant McCool)
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