Legislative, Regulatory & Legal

Premier Doug Ford is defending a controversial new law granting his government powers to extend emergency orders despite recent opposition from within his own party. Ford ejected a member of the Progressive Conservative caucus—legislator Belinda Karahalios—Tuesday after she voted against the bill.

'If you take this step, and fail to learn from the lessons in Ontario, you will be worse off than before'

Suggest a change in legislation so they can opt out of AMA

Front-line staff in Ontario hospitals held a five-minute, in-hospital protest on Tuesday as their union continues its fight against the proposed extension of the province's emergency orders. The Ontario Council of Hospital Unions, a division of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, said it does not want the province's emergency order extended in its current form because their collective bargaining agreement would be suspended.

Another record for monthly overdose deaths related to illicit drugs has been set in British Columbia, prompting the former provincial health officer to call for radical steps to reduce fatalities including access to pharmaceutical-grade heroin produced in Canada. Dr. Perry Kendall, now interim director at the BC Centre on Substance Use, said access to injectable diacetylmorphine needs to be ramped up after a sharp rise in overdose deaths four years after he declared a public health emergency.

lberta Health Minister Tyler Shandro says it's not true that doctors are quitting or withdrawing services in large numbers because of changes to fees and billing. Shandro says in a statement that the reports are nothing more than a bargaining tactic in the pay dispute between the government and physicians

Canada, Britain and the United States denounced Russian hackers on Thursday for trying to steal research on COVID-19 vaccines from organizations in all three countries and around the world. Thursday's joint declaration, led by Britain, said the hackers were almost certainly working for Russian intelligence and accused them of disrupting the global efforts to find a vaccine for the novel coronavirus.