The Chakalaka Bar and Grill near Ladysmith has been fined $2,300 for continuing to operate despite a court order to close until it has a COVID-19 safety plan approved by Island Health.
On Monday, as anti-maskers protested outside the Victoria courthouse, restaurant operator Panayiota Giannikos was also fined $4,000 and found in contempt of court for failing to disconnect drinking water and sewage-disposal systems to about 20 recreational vehicles on the property, located at 13230 Trans Canada Highway.
Island Health first visited the property in September 2020 to investigate concerns about recreational vehicle hookups.
On April 23, a B.C. Supreme Court justice granted an interim injunction to close Chakalaka Bar and Grill until it had a COVID-19 safety plan approved by Island Health. The restaurant was also to remain closed until it was inspected and found to be in compliance with provincial health orders.
Island Health said the restaurant failed to carry out daily employee health checks or ensure two-metre physical distancing.
https://www.timescol...rder-1.24317502
A new paper in the Journal of the European Economic Association, published by Oxford University Press, indicates that distrust generated by a 2011 CIA-led vaccination campaign ruse designed to catch Osama Bin Laden resulted in a significant vaccination rate decline in Pakistan.
Using a local doctor, the US Central Intelligence Organization planned an immunization plan in Pakistan to obtain DNA samples of children living in a compound in Abbottabad where American authorities suspected Bin Laden was hiding in order to obtain proof of Bin Laden's location (because the presence of close relatives would be a likely indication of Bin Laden's presence). Without consent from the Pakistani health authorities, the doctor began to administer hepatitis B vaccines to children in Abbottabad. The Guardian published an article revealing the vaccine project shortly after a United States military special operations unit killed Bin Laden on May 2, 2011.
Even prior to this campaign extremist groups in Pakistan have worked to discredit formal medicine and vaccines. By discrediting such services (which are provided by the state) extremist groups may increase the credibility of non-state actors such as the Taliban.
The Taliban increased propaganda efforts against vaccines in the aftermath of the publication of the Guardian article. In particular, the Taliban issued several religious edicts linking vaccination campaigns to CIA espionage activities and later used violent action against vaccination workers.
Using data from the Pakistan Social and Living Standards Measurement on children born between January 2010 and July 2012, researchers have investigated the effects of the disclosure of this vaccination ruse on the extent to which children in Pakistan received doses of the polio, DPT, or measles vaccine. Their estimates indicate that the vaccination rate declined between 23% and 39% in districts with higher levels of electoral support for an alliance of parties espousing political extremism relative to districts with lower levels of electoral support for such groups. The researchers' investigation also revealed that the decline in girls' vaccination rates is larger than the decline in the vaccination rate of boys.
"The empirical evidence highlights that events which cast doubt on the integrity of health workers or vaccines can have severe consequences for the acceptance of health products such as vaccines," said Andreas Stegmann, one of the paper's authors. "This seems particularly relevant today as public acceptance of the new vaccines against Covid-19 is crucial to address the pandemic."
https://www.eurekale...u-cmi050421.php
SARS-CoV-2 Research: Second possible effective mechanism of remdesivir discovered
https://aktuelles.un...vir-discovered/
https://www.scienced...10510113530.htm
DALLAS, May 10, 2021— Hospitalized COVID-19 patients with impaired first-phase ejection fraction were nearly 5 times more likely to die compared to patients with healthier measures of this early, often undetected sign of heart failure, according to new research published today in Hypertension, an American Heart Association journal. First-phase ejection fraction is a measure of the left ventricular ejection fraction until the time of maximal ventricular contraction.
Cardiovascular risk factors and/or disease have been recognized as COVID-19 risk factors that have a high negative impact on patient outcomes, since early in the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Researchers hypothesized that predisposition to heart failure would be associated with more severe cases of COVID-19 in hospitalized patients.
“Traditionally, heart function is measured by ejection fraction, or how much blood the left ventricle pumps out with each contraction of the heart,” said study author Phil Chowienczyk, M.B.B.S., B.Sc., professor of cardiovascular clinical pharmacology at St. Thomas' Hospital, in London. “First-phase ejection fraction is a new measure of the heart’s function that seems to be much more sensitive of early, undetected damage to the heart than traditional ejection fraction measures.”
*snip*
The authors found that COVID-19 patients with a first-phase ejection fraction of less than 25% had a nearly five-fold higher risk of death than those with an ejection fraction of 25% or higher. They also found that a similar proportion of people with similar risk factors who did not have COVID-19 had low values of first-phase ejection fraction. This suggests that the damage to the heart may be due to chronic pre-existing conditions and was not the result of COVID-19 infection.
“Patients with impaired first-phase ejection fraction could be prioritized for vaccines and, if they get COVID-19, monitored closely at the early stages of their illness to prevent deterioration,” Chowienczyk said. “The findings suggest that if we can prevent the very early chronic damage to the heart detected using first-phase ejection fraction imaging, then people will be much more likely to survive respiratory infections like COVID-19. Healthy lifestyle choices, better treatments and adherence to treatments for high blood pressure and high cholesterol are also important.”
Researchers note that this is a relatively small study, so the findings need to be confirmed in larger studies with more patients. If the results are confirmed, first-phase ejection fraction could be a new way to identify patients at elevated risk of dying from COVID-19 and possibly other types of pneumonia.
https://newsroom.hea...vid-19-patients
https://www.scienced...10510085859.htm
No link between ibuprofen and COVID-19 severity: study
NSAIDs do not increase symptoms
https://www.globalti...5/1222962.shtml
IOC's Dick Pound says Tokyo Olympics to move ahead despite pandemic concerns
'Postponement is off the table; it's either July 23rd or not at all,' says Pound
https://www.cbc.ca/s...cerns-1.6021433
A historic cathedral in the United Kingdom recently renovated a 14th-century shrine with an update that acknowledges the COVID-19 pandemic: a carved mask covering a stone face.
St. Albans Cathedral in Hertfordshire, England, is Britain's oldest site of continuous Christian worship. Construction began in the late 11th century on the burial location of the Christian martyr Alban, Britain's first saint, and was completed in 1115, according to the St. Albans website. The renovated shrine, added to the cathedral in 1350, honors the early Christian saint Amphibalus, and it's one of two shrines in the cathedral (the other, added around 1308, commemorates St. Alban).
In addition to repairing and rebuilding the damaged parts of the shrine, stoneworkers added the new carving to commemorate the health crisis that transformed the world in 2020 and 2021, St. Albans representatives said in a statement. Now, the shrine features a new face — but only the eyes are visible. The rest of the features are hidden under a protective face mask, a sight that has become all too familiar worldwide during the COVID-19 pandemic.
https://www.livescie...sk-carving.html
How One of Europe's Smallest States, San Marino, is Winning the COVID War Thanks to Russia's Vaccine
https://sputniknews....ussias-vaccine/
The bodies of at least 40 people have washed up on the banks of the Ganges river in northern India, officials say.
The discovery, near the border between the states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, was confirmed to the BBC on Monday.
It is not clear how the bodies came to be there, but local media reports suggest they may be Covid-19 victims.
Some media reports say as many as 100 bodies have been found, and that their condition suggests they may have been in the river for several days.
"There is a possibility that these bodies have come out of Uttar Pradesh," a local official, Ashok Kumar, told the BBC after questioning local residents.
He said the remains would be buried or cremated.
https://www.bbc.com/...-india-57061452
Most of China are enjoying the benefits of having effectively controlled COVID-19, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Monday.
Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO Health Emergencies Program, made the remarks while replying to a question over the annual Wuhan Strawberry Music Festival that attracted thousands of revelers as well as global media outlets' attentions earlier this month, after the once hardest-hit Chinese city revived from the epidemic.
Noting that China and other countries, which have a very low incidence rate, remain exceptionally vigilant constantly on the lookout for occasional clusters, Ryan said that those countries "react extremely quickly when they see those clusters in order to maintain that level of control."
http://www.ecns.cn/n...ef9041810.shtml
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