Canada - Coronavirus COVID-19 #3

[otto]

University campuses are set to open to in-class learning next week. I just received an email that a covid positive student attended a new student orientation earlier this week, so the entire building is undergoing deep cleaning and all students who attended the orientation are advised to be tested. I'm curious whether campuses will be forced to shut down within 2-3 weeks, and move to online learning for another semester.

 

[otto]

Our grocery pick up has to be for a minimum of $35, otherwise there is a charge for pick up. Also, I think delivery has a charge, regardless of the cost of the order. I haven't used delivery yet, so not sure what the cost is.

There is a minimum grocery order cost to access online grocery shopping. With the cost of food today, it doesn't take long to spend $1-200 per order.

 

[JDG]

I’ve had good luck with WalMart, both picking up and delivery, except for the last one. Half my groceries were missing but they gave me full credit. Annoying though as I had to get them elsewhere the next morning. Have used WalMart thru most of the pandemic. Pick up is free with $35 order.

I’ve used my local Metro, three times, they are new to it but did a good job once I told the manager that I had to go into the store to tell them I was there. They were not answering the phone number on the post. Now, it’s fine. Pick up is free with $50 order.

 

[otto]

Grocery stores are definitely experiencing growing pains in offering online shopping, but the service is greatly appreciated.

 

[JDG]

Well overall, I hope that online grocery shopping remains after the pandemic.

It’s so very convenient to just add things to your cart, as if making a list…then when you’ve spent enough, pay and pick it up.

You can order for up to 9 days in advance and the prices are the same as in the store/flyer.

No more trudging out in the cold snow to get basics!

Love it.

 

[deugirtni]

The one grocery store that repeatedly provided nearly expired food and dinged-up fruit provided a full refund for those products. That was achieved in a phone call. It's unfortunate when the food is rotten because you plan meals and need everything that is ordered. After a few incidents like this, I switched grocery stores. I haven't had the same experience at the newly chosen shop.

There's no extra cost for online shopping and store pick-up. It is important to review the receipt for price errors. I was charged nearly $5 for 500 ml Ginger Ale bottle. It was a bizarre experience talking to customer service about the over-charge. The cost is $1.29. I pointed out that they charged triple the true cost, and the young woman at customer service kept insisting that I'd saved $0.60 in bottle deposit. It made no sense. It's as though she didn't understand numbers. She kept insisting that I'd saved 0.60 and ignored that I'd overpaid. Eventually she gave me a credit for the $5, but what an odd conversation. Shopping in person means we can avoid knowing that some employees speak nonsense.

Ha, yes,... or not!

 

[otto]

Alberta postponing scheduled surgeries to make room for covid people.

"Alberta Health Services is postponing scheduled surgeries throughout the province to create capacity in intensive care units as COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations surge.

"When I spoke with the media earlier this week, I stated that the pressure on our health-care system was building," Dr. Verna Yiu, president and CEO, said Friday during a high-profile joint news conference with Premier Jason Kenney, Health Minister Tyler Shandro and Dr. Deena Hinshaw, Alberta's chief medical officer of health.

"Today we are taking additional steps to relieve some of that pressure."
...

As of Thursday, there are 487 people in hospital being treated for COVID-19, including 114 patients in ICU.

Alberta's ICUs are at 95 per cent capacity, Yiu said.
...

Earlier this week, AHS announced that it would require its employees and contracted health-care workers to be fully vaccinated by the end of October. "​

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmo...rvices-surgeries-postponed-covid-19-1.6164382

 

[tarabull]

Alberta reinstates mask mandate and liquor curfew, implements financial incentive for unvaccinated amid surge in COVID-19 cases | Edmonton Journal

(Ya'll know what comes next right???)

 

[otto]

New restrictions announced for Alberta. If 80% of hospital admissions are unvaccinated people, does that mean that 20% are vaccinated?

"Faced with surging cases and the lowest vaccination rate in the country, Alberta will begin paying $100 to people who get a first or second dose of COVID-19 vaccine, Premier Jason Kenney announced Friday.

The move is part of a suite of new measures announced by the province, including making masks mandatory for all indoor public spaces and workplaces starting Saturday. ... "I wish we didn't have to do this, but this is not a time for moral judgments," he said about the incentive program, which is expected to cost about $20 million.

Among the public health measures announced Friday are:

• Beginning Saturday, restaurants, cafés, bars, pubs and nightclubs will be required to end alcohol service at 10 p.m.
• Unvaccinated Albertans are strongly recommended to limit indoor social gatherings to close contacts of only two cohort families, up to a maximum of 10 people.
• Alberta Health is developing a QR code that will allow Albertans to quickly prove their vaccination status.
• Employers are urged to pause return-to-work plans and instead continue with work-from-home measures. If employees are working on location, employees must mask for all indoor settings, except in work stations or where two-metre physical distancing or adequate physical barriers are in place.
• School boards will continue set their own masking rules for schools.

Unvaccinated people have made up more than 80 per cent of all hospital admissions since July 1, he said.
​

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/alberta-covid-kenney-hinshaw-1.6163826

 

[otto]

Alberta reinstates mask mandate and liquor curfew, implements financial incentive for unvaccinated amid surge in COVID-19 cases | Edmonton Journal

(Ya'll know what comes next right???)

What are you thinking?

 

[musicaljoke]

There's a CBC article about BC being ready to administer boosters, but my opinion is that a better vaccine is needed.

Yes, I expect we will see a better vaccine in the future. I wonder if there is any discussion at all about giving kids a modified live vaccine. My guess is that they would never need another vaccine during their lifetime, but honestly, I don't know if that is true.

 

[musicaljoke]

Alberta reinstates mask mandate and liquor curfew, implements financial incentive for unvaccinated amid surge in COVID-19 cases | Edmonton Journal

(Ya'll know what comes next right???)

Yes, the case numbers should start dropping like a stone. We've been through this cycle so many times now that we know exactly what will happen.

 

[otto]

Yes, the case numbers should start dropping like a stone. We've been through this cycle so many times now that we know exactly what will happen.

What I find scientifically strange is that every time the numbers are artificially reduced though restrictions, the government claims we've managed another wave. It seems more like the pandemic has had maybe 2 waves, and we're heading into a third. The government will artificially manage numbers, then lift restrictions, and then it will happen again and they'll call it the 5th or 7th wave.

 

[otto]

Alberta is offering booster shots to :

• immunocompromised Albertans ages 12 and older
• residents of seniors’ supportive living facilities
• travellers to jurisdictions that don't recognize Covishield/AstraZeneca or mixed series doses

 

[tarabull]

What are you thinking?

Sadly otto I'm thinking lockdown...fwiw.

 

[tarabull]

More than 100 Ontario youth sent to hospital for vaccine-related heart problems: Report | Canoe.Com

 

[tarabull]

CBC.ca: 'My last straw': Vancouver paramedic on brink of quitting due to hospital protests.

 

[otto]

Sadly otto I'm thinking lockdown...fwiw.

I agree. If nothing changes, Alberta will be in full lockdown in a couple of weeks.

It looks like the age group that can prevent lockdown is the group who will be most upset by lockdown - the same group that is unvaccinated.

Perhaps the $100 gift card for vaccine in Alberta is the right approach for the 18-39 age group.

"Canada's chief public health officer says there is an urgent need for more people between the ages of 18 and 39 to get vaccinated against COVID-19 to reduce the impact of the delta variant.

"This is a crucial moment," Dr. Theresa Tam said Friday at her first in-person COVID-19 briefing since Aug. 12.

"We have a window of opportunity to rapidly accelerate vaccine uptake and close the protection gap in younger age groups."

The number of cases in Canada each day grew from about 700 in early August, to almost 3,500 now. The vast majority of cases are among unvaccinated individuals, and Tam said unvaccinated people are 12 times more likely to be infected and 36 times more likely to be hospitalized if they get infected.
...

It doesn't have to mean lockdowns, she said, which nobody wants. Tam said more vaccinations — particularly among younger adults — and targeted measures, such as public mask mandates and capacity limits, should do it."​

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/coronavirus-covid19-canada-world-sept4-2021-1.6165002

 

[LadyL]

Just out of curiosity, how do you handle receiving products with limited time left before expiry? Must you accept those products since their expiry date is still valid, even though if you were shopping for yourself, you wouldn't have chosen it? Obviously retailers are getting the best options by picking and packing groceries on behalf of their customers since they can pick the earliest expiry dates, the produce which is perhaps just starting to wilt, or whatever, instead of allowing customers to rifle through the shelves to find the longest expiry dates and choose the best looking produce. Not that that is necessarily a bad thing, since I completely understand the predicament of grocery stores in dealing with this sort of thing and trying to remain profitable. The thing I am noticing more and more just generally (I have never ordered groceries online yet.), is that expiry dates seem to be becoming sooner and sooner. ie I swear my mother had things on her shelves for YEARS and they were still edible, but buy something nowadays, and you maybe have a year, if you're lucky. I am usually very good about checking dates and have taught my boys to CHECK THE DAMN DATES if they pick something up at the grocery store, but the other day, I bought a shaker of something at Costco, just as kind of a humorous gift for someone as I had never seen it before.. and I was so peeved when I got home and noticed the expiry date is one month from now. The shaker stuff will last likely for a year at least as far as being used up. Costco, of all places, where they've got product coming in and going out so fast apparently??!! Do you pay extra for having the retailer do the picing/packing for you, or are groceries the same price as if you had shopped yourself?

groceries are same price at the two grocery stores I alternate buying from
one charges a $3 pickup fee; the other charges $5 - both cancelled the pick up charges for a year or more during Covid
I only check expiry dates on fresh stuff
that shaker thing you got - was it a 'best before' or 'expiry' date?
a lot of pantry items can still be used past the best before date
I've also used stuff beyond the expiry date before by doing my smell test lol

 

[deugirtni]

groceries are same price at the two grocery stores I alternate buying from
one charges a $3 pickup fee; the other charges $5 - both cancelled the pick up charges for a a year or more during Covid
I only check expiry dates on fresh stuff
that shaker thing you got - was it a 'best before' or 'expiry' date?
a lot of pantry items can still be used past the best before date
I've also used stuff beyond the expiry date before by doing my smell test lol

It was 'best before', but it peed me off, especially since it was more of a jokey type of gifty thing, but would be hoped to last at LEAST a year. I'm the queen of using things past their dates (because everything nowadays seems so quick to expire!), but it annoys me that one of the very few times I don't even think to check the date, it only had one month, and with it being for someone else, they may not feel comfortable using past the 'best before'.