Unvaccinated invited to take part in COVID study

Ottawa residents who have not yet received a COVID-19 vaccine, as well as those who have received a first dose in the last 55 days but not a second, are being encouraged to take part in a study aimed at assessing mix-and-match COVID -19 vaccine strategies.

A tweet from The Ottawa Hospital refers readers to the study by the Canadian Immunization Research Network (CIRN) and Canadian Center for Vaccinology.

The study will look at the effect of dosing intervals on effectiveness and safety; immune responses to different combinations of vaccines; and the length of immune responses. A total of 1,200 participants are being sought in various locations in Canada.

Participants must be at least 18, not pregnant, in good health and available for study visits.

Earlier Tuesday, Canada signed an agreement with U.S. drug manufacturer Moderna, Inc., promising to build an mRNA production plant in Canada.

Federal Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne said some details of the deal, including the amount the government will contribute and the location and expected opening date of the plant, are still being negotiated.

This is the second such deal the government has inked in recent months. In May, it said it would provide $199 million to Resilience Technologies in Mississauga, about half the cost of expanding its plant there to make up to 640 million doses of mRNA vaccine annually.

Ontario's Health Ministry also said Tuesday that it has changed its daily information website to add measurements to comparing vaccinated and unvaccinated cases and hospital admissions.

Meanwhile, Ontario long-term care homes are asking the province to mandate COVID -19 vaccination for their staff as well as health-care workers in all settings.

The Ontario Long-Term Care Association, which represents nearly 70 per cent of the province's longterm care operators — private, notfor-profit, charitable and municipal — says the measures would protect residents and ensure facilities don't lose their staff to other health-care facilities.

AdvantAge Ontario, which advocates solely for not-for-profit and municipal homes in the province, is similarly calling on the provincial government to mandate vaccinations for workers in long-term care and all health care.

The province requires staff in long-term care homes to disclose their COVID-19 vaccination status, and those who are unvaccinated for non-medical reasons have to undergo education about the importance of immunization.

But Premier Doug Ford has refused to mandate vaccines in any setting.

With files from The Canadian Press. bdeachman@postmedia.com