National News

Provinces have been releasing plans for easing restrictions that were put in place to limit the spread of COVID-19.

For months, their contents have sat locked up in the stale hallway air in schools across the country.

VANCOUVER — A rising death toll from overdoses in B.C. during the COVID-19 pandemic has advocates, government officials and health-care workers concerned about a public health emergency that has been overshadowed by the response to the virus.

The latest numbers of confirmed and presumptive COVID-19 cases in Canada as of 7:08 p.m. ET on May 15, 2020: There are 74,613 confirmed and presumptive cases in Canada.

The latest news on the COVID-19 global pandemic (all times Eastern): 6:50 p.m. The B.C. government has announced five more deaths from COVID-19, bringing the province's death toll to 140.

OTTAWA — An all-party committee is recommending the House of Commons hold additional virtual sittings to conduct all its regular business — including voting — during the COVID-19 pandemic.

OTTAWA — Outgoing Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer chuckled Friday when asked if he wishes he had done anything differently during his time at the party's helm. "Well, clearly," he said.

PRINCE ALBERT, Sask. — The family of a Saskatchewan couple and their grandson, who were slain in their home nearly seven weeks ago, say the surviving granddaughter is doing well in hospital.

WASHINGTON — Canada and the United States are both "very comfortable" with their mutual ban on non-essential cross-border travel, but Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland won't say if the Americans want to extend the restrictions beyond June 21.

TORONTO — Amid still rising case counts and further signs of the economic devastation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced Friday that businesses can take advantage of emergency wage subsidies until the end of Augu