Your weekly COVID-19 update Every Tuesday, the Maclean's daily newsletter will catch you up on what you need to know about Canada's fight against the coronavirus. This week, Patricia Treble focuses on one story worth watching, and you can get a sneak peek here. You'll also get the same mix of Maclean's stories you expect every day if you scroll down below. On Tuesday, the Ontario government announced that it would vaccinate all residents, workers and essential caregivers in long-term care (LTC) facilities in the hotspots of Toronto, Peel and York Regions as well as Windsor-Essex by Jan. 21. One reason for the accelerated vaccination plans in Ontario, Quebec, Alberta and elsewhere, is, in part, thanks to a change in procedure that could have a huge impact on the course of the pandemic: they are no longer automatically reserving 50 per cent of doses in freezers for the required second jab, but instead assuming future supplies will be sufficient for those second doses (the Pfizer vaccine requires a second dose three weeks after the first, while the Moderna vaccine requires one four weeks later). One reason for the change is research pointing to its benefits, including modelling done by Dr. Ashleigh Tuite, infectious disease epidemiologist at the University of Toronto. In a study she co-authored, published today in the Annals of Internal Medicine, Tuite showed that front-loading the distribution of first doses by allocating the vast majority of the first weeks’ worth of vaccines could mean an additional 23-29 per cent of COVID-19 cases would be averted compared with the previous “reserve” strategy. “The people who are going to benefit the most are those who are older and in long-term care homes,” Tuite told Maclean’s. “We have this vaccine now, and, if we use it strategically, we can prevent a lot of infections and a lot of deaths in those settings.” READ MORE >> | 
