France has been more successful than Canada in implementing a COVID-19 app. We extend our appreciation to Maia Foulis for bringing us this article that highlights the French experience with the app.

Two weeks after the World Health Organization designated Omicron a variant of concern, it has dominated headlines, sparking renewed fears about the spread of COVID-19 and forcing countries to strengthen their vaccination campaigns with booster shots. This is a 10 December 2021 article by Nicole Bogart, CTVNews.ca, @nlynnbogart.

Canadians need to get booster shots, limit contacts to prevent uncontrollable spike in cases, top doctor says. This is a 13 December 2021 article by John Paul Tasker, CBC News.

The Ontario government’s move to expand eligibility for the COVID-19 booster dose comes at a critical time in the fight against the virus. RNAO continues to ask the government to make vaccination for healthcare workers mandatory. With another winter approaching, the government must urgently address the crisis in nursing human resources, starting with the repeal of Bill 124. The emergence of the Omicron variant is the result of global vaccine inequity.

Health Canada approved on November 19 the use of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine in children 5 to 11 years of age. The following is a November 5 article by Alexander Wong, an associate professor of infectious diseases at the University of Saskatchewan.

RNAO issued the following media release in response to the Ontario government’s reopening plan.

Throughout September, RNAO focused most of its media presence on the following topics: Ontario’s new vaccine certificate system, condemning anti-vax protests, the federal election and the crisis facing the nursing profession.

The Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario (RNAO) commends and fully supports Minister of Long-Term Care (LTC) Rod Phillips’s announcement on mandatory vaccination for all in-home staff, support workers, students and volunteers in LTC, effective Nov. 15. As RNAO has publicly stated many times, this is a necessary action that will further protect LTC residents and staff from COVID-19 infection caused by unvaccinated health-care workers.

At a time when long-term care (LTC) residents are still being infected and dying from COVID-19 because of unvaccinated health-care workers, the Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario (RNAO) says the provincial government's announcement Friday should have been about mandatory vaccination for all health-care workers. Instead, it was about raising capacity limits for sporting events.