Nickel Belt News Volume 61 • Issue 16
Friday, April 23, 2021
Thompson, Manitoba
Serving the Norman Region since 1961
Some First Nations have already administered first doses of to every adult who wanted one
BY IAN GRAHAM
EDITOR@THOMPSONCITIZEN.NET
Close to three-quarters of Manitoba’s 63 First Nations had received COVID-19 vaccine allocations equal to as much as 75 per cent of their members by the end of last week and some that started their mass vaccine campaigns earliest have already administered first doses to every adult who wanted one. Melanie MacKinnon, a member of Manitoba’s vaccine implementation task force, said during an April 13 Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO) Facebook press conference that 37,500 of 40,000 first doses allocated
to Manitoba First Nations for vaccination campaigns would have been distributed by the end of last week and that the last shipments of initial doses were expected to arrive in Manitoba around the same time. “It’s been a very successful campaign in regards to distribution,” she said, as First Nations, with assistance from the Canadian Armed Forces and other organizations like the Red Cross, attempt to deliver 100,000 vaccine doses in 100 days. “Now we need those vaccines in arms.” Although there has been vaccine hesitancy in some First Nations, MacKinnon said in others uptake is as
high as 75 to nearly 80 per cent of adults. “More and more people are wanting to be immunized so that’s fantastic news,” MacKinnon said. Dr. Michael Routledge, medical advisor to MKO’s health organization Keewatinohk Inniniw Minoayawin Inc., said vaccine hesitancy is nothing new and urged anyone with questions to ask a trusted health care professional rather than relying on information from social media or other sources, which may not be scientifically valid. “They work,” he said. “We’ve seen that around the world.” Despite the effectiveness
2019 flight crew’s sighting of an unidentified light in the sky over Northern Manitoba was reported to the air force and Transport Canada, Vice reports
A report of an unidentified light spotted by the crew of a medical transport flight in the sky over Northern Manitoba in 2019 was forwarded to an air force squadron and then on to Transport Canada, Vice World News reported in an April 12 article. The no threat Communications Instructions for Reporting Vital Intelligence Sightings (CIRVIS) report was created on Jan. 6, 2019 after the crew of a Vanguard Air Care flight saw an unidentified light moving parallel to them for about three minutes while they were travelling at about 425 kilometres per hour at an altitude of 7,500 feet around the 55th parallel. The report says the brightness of the light in the night sky was what attracted the observer’s attention and
that NAV Canada’s Winnipeg Air Control Centre (ACC) assumed that it was another aircraft. 21 Aerospace Control and Warning Squadron at Canadian Forces Base North Bay in Ontario, whose mission it is to protect Canada under the term’s of the Canada-U.S. joint air defence pact known as NORAD, was notified of the sighting. An unclassified intelligence report was then faxed to Transport Canada. A Royal Canadian Air Force spokesperson told Vice that Transport Canada is the primary investigator of CIRVIS reports. Transport Canada told them reports of unidentified object usually can’t be followed up on because they are unidentified. NAV Canada, a private company that owns and operates civilian air navigation infrastructure like air
traffic control centres, told Vice it sometimes provides information on unauthorized or unknown aircraft in North American airspace to the military, NORAD and Transport Canada. Winnipeg-based UFO researcher Chris Rutowski told Vice that there are only a handful of CIRVIS reports filed every year but they do show that pilots sometimes se unidentified objects in North American airspace. The fact that they get passed on to Transport Canada as unclassified documents suggest that they are not regarded as security or defence issues, said Rutkowski, who has collected information on over 22,000 UFO sightings from the last three decades and has used information from CIRVIS reports in his annual Canadian UFO Survey.
of vaccines, MKO First Nations are still a long way from herd immunity, he said, and COVID-19 test positivity rates in Northern Manitoba remain “stubbornly high,” hovering around the 15 per cent level, on average A pop-up vaccination clinic for Cross Lake First Nation members living off-reserve took place in Thompson April 14-17 at 90 Thompson Drive North. Although travel to the north or any unnecessary travel isn’t recommended at this time, Routledge said getting vaccinated is a worthwhile reason. “Obviously any travel presents some risk but we need people to travel to
immunization sites to get vaccinated,” he said MKO Vice-Chief Shirley Ducharme of O-Pipon-Na-Piwin Cree Nation at South Indian Lake said her community, which saw more than 100 COVID-19 cases at one point, has already provided two doses of vaccine to all elders 65 and older and first doses to frontline workers, with clinics for all adults scheduled for April 21-22. She also said that partnerships with the military and other organizations have been welcome in smaller First Nations like hers with limited resources. “We only have limited frontline workers and they
do burn out,” Ducharme said. As of April 15, nearly 30,000 First Nations people in Manitoba have received COVID vaccines, including about 6,000 who have received two doses. In the NRHA, 10,589 First Nations people have received first doses and 2,152 have also gotten second doses. MacKinnnon says those numbers probably reflect what the situation was at the end of March as there can be a lag getting information entered into the tracking system because many First Nations don’t have electronic health records and some have internet connectivity issues.
Thompson RCMP officers rescue injured snowmobiler via helicopter
A 66-year-old man who was injured while snowmobiling was rescued by Thompson RCMP officers April 18. The officers travelled by helicopter to Dafoe Lake, about a three-hour snowmobile ride from Split Lake, and the man was airlifted to Thompson General Hospital for treatment of non-life-threatening injuries. Police were notified around 9:30 p.m. Sunday about the injured man by a 23-year-
old snowmobiler who had been with the injured man and another man aged 60 when the eldest one got injured. The 23-year-old had ridden to Split Lake to summon help while the other two men remained at a cabin near Dafoe Lake as the injured man could not make the trip to Split Lake. Though the man was not alone and in a cabin with supplies, offices determined that he needed medical assistance immediately. The injured man remains in hospital.