TORONTO Ontario saw fewer early premature births during the first six months of the COVID-19 pandemic, and a new study is suggesting that it may be associated with strict lockdown measures. Unity Health Toronto released their findings on Wednesday, saying they examined just over 67,000 births in Ontario between March and September 2020, and marked a “small, but significant” reduction in very early premature births compared to the same time periods from the previous five years. A pregnancy typically lasts about 40 weeks, and a baby is considered preterm or premature if it is delivered before 37 weeks. If the baby is born before 32 weeks, it’s considered a very early preterm birth.
SASKATOON Advocates say Canada should learn from San Francisco’s approach in allowing homeless people to voluntarily quarantine in repurposed hotels, which includes providing them with behavioural health support. The city’s hotel-based quarantine program which offers rooms, as well as medical care and behavioural health support for two weeks was safe and highly effective at reducing the spread of COVID-19 in the community, according to a new U.S. study. The findings, published in the medical journal JAMA Network Open last week, noted how 81 per cent of people completed their quarantine, with only four per cent of those who’d been moved there from the hospital needing to be readmitted due to COVID-19 complications.