Darpan News Desk The Canadian Press, 01 Sep, 2023 11:01 AM
The latest G-D-P report showing the economy contracted at an annualized rate of 0.2 per cent in the second quarter may signal an end to the Bank of Canada's rate hiking campaign.
Economist Tu Nguyen (WIN) at R-S-M Canada says the cooling economy should be enough evidence for the central bank to forgo further rate hikes unless there is another major external shock that sends inflation upward.
She says this is the first time since the early days of the pandemic that spending on services did not grow, which is a powerful sign of a cooling economy.
Modelling expert Sarah Otto of the Coronavirus Variants Rapid Response Network says the fast-spreading subvariant is on track to dominate infections across the country. The University of British Columbia professor predicted a July wave, peaking in August.
Canada's chief public health officer Theresa Tam says circulating Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 are even more transmissible and able to evade immunity than previous versions, making a rise in cases likely in coming weeks.
The policy, more than five years in the making, will clearly label products with the so-called "nutrients of public health concern" that have been linked to conditions such as cardiovascular disease and Type 2 diabetes.
Chief public health officer Theresa Tam says there are "continuing discussions and contract negotiations" to obtain doses from Bavarian Nordic, the Danish manufacturer of a smallpox vaccine approved for use against monkeypox.
Mike Farnworth says that would give displaced residents returning home a sense of their future after 90 per cent of their village burned to the ground last June 30 during a record-setting heat wave.