There had been a shortage of the vaccine in recent days after the previous supply’s cold chain – the mechanism by which vaccines are kept refrigerated prior to use – broke down.
On Friday morning, the health authority said more supplies had arrived and anyone can now request a Covid-19 vaccine at Yellowknife’s Centre Square Mall clinic.
Comments closedChanges to the Alberta government’s COVID vaccination plan this year mean many Albertans are facing long waitlists and a hefty bill to get their shot.
With the government-run program only offered through public health clinics and many of those clinics experiencing long waits, some Albertans are choosing instead to go to their local pharmacist to get immunized — as they have done in previous years.
Comments closedChildren and young people faced long-lasting and higher risks of rare heart and inflammatory complications after COVID-19 infection, compared to before or without an infection, according to new research. Meanwhile COVID-19 vaccination was only linked to a short-term higher risk of myocarditis and pericarditis.
The study is the largest of its kind in this population, and is published today in The Lancet Child and Adolescent Health. It was led by scientists at the Universities of Cambridge and Edinburgh, and University College London, with support from the British Heart Foundation (BHF) Data Science Centre at Health Data Research UK.
Comments closedThe risk of long COVID was 36% lower in adolescents vaccinated within 6 months before their first infection than in their unvaccinated peers, suggests an analysis of US Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery (RECOVER) trial data published late last week in Vaccine.
The study, led by Massachusetts General Hospital researchers, involved 724 adolescents aged 12 to 17 years who were vaccinated against COVID-19 within the previous 6 months and 507 unvaccinated youth matched on sex, symptom onset, and enrollment date.
Comments closedThe risk of a heart attack triples within the first few weeks after a Covid-19 infection, the study suggested, and quadruples in the month after a flu infection. The study, published Wednesday in the Journal of the American Heart Association, was a large review and analysis of existing research.
“It endorses a general idea that we’ve been thinking about and talking about for the past several years — that infections are generally not benign,” said Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly, a senior clinical epidemiologist at Washington University in St. Louis, who was not involved in the study.
Comments closedSt. John’s hosted the 2025 Canadian Symposium on Long COVID earlier this month, a gathering of top researchers, clinicians, and people living with long COVID.…
Comments closedOctober 28, 2025 (Ottawa): As Canada enters another respiratory virus season, pharmacists are urging Canadians to protect themselves and their communities as new polling shows vaccination intentions remain low.
According to a new national survey conducted by Abacus Data for the Canadian Pharmacists Association (CPhA), 43% of Canadians plan to get their seasonal flu shot, and 29% intend to receive a COVID-19 vaccine this fall. Most concerning, nearly 4 in 10 Canadians (39%) say they don’t plan to get either vaccine.
Comments closedThe updated 2024-25 COVID-19 vaccines provided 57% protection against hospitalization and death, although their effectiveness waned over time, according to a study yesterday in JAMA Internal Medicine.
The study assessed effectiveness against infection, emergency department (ED) visits, and hospitalization. Protection against infection and ED visits was 45%.
The study was based on outcomes seen among Nebraskan residents during the 2024-25 respiratory virus season and used hospital discharge data from member hospitals of the Nebraska Hospital Association and data from death certificates from the Nebraska Office of Vital Records.
Comments closedTORONTO — Canada is poised to lose its international status as a measles-free country now that an outbreak that began in New Brunswick and spread to other provinces has hit the one-year mark.
The country eliminated measles in 1998 and maintained that status for more than 25 years, meaning there was no ongoing community transmission and new cases were travel-related.
But since Oct. 27, 2024, the virus has spread to more than 5,000 people in Canada, including two infants in Ontario and Alberta who were infected with measles in the womb and died after they were born.
Comments closedEDMONTON – Alberta doctors say the province’s effort to save money on COVID-19 vaccines could end up costing taxpayers far more in public health-care costs.
Dr. Brian Wirzba, head of the Alberta Medical Association, which represents doctors in the province, says there’s still time for the government to improve public communication about vaccines and make them more accessible.
“In my clinic talking to patients, they’re still confused about how they could even get it,” said Wirzba, who practises internal medicine in Edmonton.
Comments closedSome Albertans struggled to book COVID-19 shots as the province’s fall immunization campaign opened to the general public on Monday.
By late afternoon, Health Link had been flooded with more than 10,000 calls related to the COVID vaccine alone and a spokesperson for Primary Care Alberta confirmed the provincial health information phone line was facing extremely high call volumes.
Comments closedWalk-in clinics for the flu and Covid-19 vaccine open in Yellowknife later in October, the NWT’s health authority confirmed in a schedule issued late last week.
Comments closedThe innovative messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines that thwarted the ravages of COVID-19 may also help fight tumors in cancer patients, according to a new analysis of medical records and studies in mice.
People with cancer who coincidentally received the mRNA shots before starting drugs designed to unleash the immune system against tumors lived significantly longer than those who didn’t get vaccinated, a research team announced yesterday at the European Society for Medical Oncology Congress in Berlin. Laboratory experiments by the group suggest the vaccines rev up the immune system, making even stubborn tumors more susceptible to treatment.
Comments closedFederal health officials are examining the feasibility of taking aluminum salts out of vaccines, a prospect that vaccine experts said would wipe out about half of the nation’s supply of childhood inoculations and affect shots that protect against whooping cough, polio and deadly flu.
The review at the Food and Drug Administration began after President Trump listed aluminum in vaccines as harmful during a press briefing about the unproven link between Tylenol and autism.
Aluminum salts have been in vaccines since the 1920s and are added to enhance the immune-stimulating effect against the virus or bacteria covered by the inoculation. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nation’s health secretary, has been a longtime critic of aluminum in vaccines, which he has suggested is linked to autism.
Vaccine experts said the tiny amount of aluminum salts in vaccines — often measured in the one-millionth of a gram — has a long track record of safety and is essential to generating lasting immunity from disease. Developing vaccines without aluminum salts, they said, would require an entirely new formulation from scratch.
Comments closedAs respiratory illness season approaches, B.C. will begin rolling out its annual vaccination campaign for COVID-19 and influenza.
British Columbians began receiving notifications with a link to book vaccine appointments on Oct. 7 and they will continue to be sent out into November.
Appointments for both influenza and COVID-19 shots will begin on Oct. 14, starting with those at highest risk of severe illness.
Both vaccines are available for free for anyone older than six months.
Comments closedNova Scotia residents can now book appointments for the COVID-19 and influenza vaccines.
The Nova Scotia government says the free vaccines are recommended for everyone aged six months and older.
Nova Scotians can book an appointment with their family doctor, nurse practitioner or family practice nurse, or at their local pharmacy, public health office or mobile unit.
Comments closedQuebecers can now book their appointments as the province’s fall vaccination campaign is underway but unlike previous years the COVID-19 shot is no longer free for all.
Unless an individual is part of a high-risk group, the Association québécoise des pharmaciens propriétaires (AQPP) had said that the cost for a vaccine dose will range between $150 and $180.
The COVID-19 vaccine remains free of charge to:
COVID-19 causes women’s blood vessels to age prematurely, according to an international study involving two researchers from Université Laval. The disease should therefore be considered an additional risk factor in cardiovascular health analyses. Specifically, in those who have developed severe symptoms, they warn.
The aging of blood vessels results in greater rigidity, which can increase the risk of certain cardiovascular diseases.
“The heart must work a little harder to propel blood through the arterial system, and this causes variations in pressure that can damage sensitive organs, including the brain and kidneys,” explains Catherine Fortier, a kinesiologist and researcher in vascular aging at the CHU de Québec-Université Laval.
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