Your daily COVID-19 update QUOTE OF THE DAY: “It is deeply disturbing.” — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, of a Canadian Armed Forces report on the horrifying situations the military encountered at five long-term care homes in Ontario. The number of Canadians infected with COVID-19 has passed 86,000, while 6,600 people have died. Worldwide, 5.5 million people have been infected while 350,000 have died. Researchers at Yale University may have found a way to predict the number of COVID-19 cases in a community a week in advance. Their pre-publication study showed that the concentration of the virus’s RNA in sewage was a seven-day leading (or advance) indicator of positive COVID-19 tests and a three-day advance indicator for hospital admissions. The 96-year-old mother of Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte died last week in a nursing home (reportedly not of COVID-19). Rutte didn’t see her in the last three weeks of her life due to the COVID-19 restrictions that he helped set. His adherence to the rules is in sharp contrast with other European politicians and advisors, who have been caught breaking their national lockdown rules. Vermont police closed a major highway in Burlington so a local food bank, helped by the National Guard, could distribute needed boxes of food to residents in a seemingly endless line of cars. “Quarantine was supposed to buy Ontario time….[to] use the finite time people would agree to staying in their homes to develop a plan to deal with COVID-19 if and when a second wave emerges. Ontario failed to do that,” wrote Robyn Urback in a scathing column in the Globe and Mail. Dr. Mike Ryan of the World Health Organization is worried that jurisdictions will experience a second peak to the current wave of COVID-19 cases by reopening too swiftly, something that may be occurring right now in Ontario. In a sign that the nation won’t soon return to “before times” standards, Porter Airlines announced that it is pushing back its plan to resume flights until July 29, a month longer than previously scheduled. On Her Majesty’s Service: A group of some 24 staff are keeping Queen Elizabeth II, 94, and her husband, Prince Philip, 96, safe and healthy in Windsor Castle, the Sun reports. In an operation dubbed HMS Bubble, two teams of 12 people work three weeks on, three weeks off. The shifts include stints in quarantine, as well as testing, so they don’t bring the virus to the royals. In a Twitter thread today, author J.K. Rowling made a “small announcement” that had kids and adults alike jumping for joy: she was releasing an unpublished fairy tale, The Ickabog, which had been stuffed into a dusty box in her attic until she dusted it off. Not only is she slowly adding chapters online and donating her royalties to charity, but kids are encouraged to create and submit illustrations in a contest to decide which ones will go into the published version—including one of Fred the Fearless by Sophia, 8, from Canada, that Rowling called “adorable.” —Patricia Treble As of the latest update, this is the number of confirmed cases in Canada. We're updating this chart every day.
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