Around Ontario

TORONTO — Calls for Ontario Premier Doug Ford to undo new wide-ranging COVID-19 restrictions on outdoor recreational activities grew louder Sunday amid pledges of federal help to ease the toll on the province's strained health-care system.

MONTREAL — Quebec is reporting 1,344 COVID-19 cases and nine deaths, including two in the past 24 hours. Hospitalizations in the province declined slightly for the first time since early April, falling by nine to 683.

TORONTO — The Toronto Raptors will keep forward Freddie Gillespie around longer. Toronto signed Gillespie to a second 10-day contract Sunday. The six-foot-nine, 245-pound player from Saint Paul, Minn., averaged 5.8 points, 4.

MONTREAL — Provincial police have identified two bodies discovered Friday in a home on Montreal's South Shore, saying the deaths resulted from domestic violence as Quebec's femicide crisis continues.

Public health experts are raising their eyebrows at Ontario's decision to close recreational facilities, saying science shows COVID-19 transmission outside is extremely rare.

MONTREAL — Quebec is reporting its highest number of hospitalizations and intensive care cases due to COVID-19 since the second wave.

TORONTO — Canadian boxer Mandy Bujold has hit another huge road block in Tokyo Olympic qualifying. This one might be insurmountable. After a competitive year wiped out by COVID-19, the 11-time national flyweight champion from Kitchener, Ont.

TORONTO — Ontario extended a stay-at-home order and announced new restrictions to fight COVID-19 on Friday, while giving police new powers to enforce the measures.

MONTREAL — Quebec will deploy sound trucks in hard-hit Montreal neighbourhoods to announce the presence of mobile clinics offering Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccines, Health Minister Christian Dube said Friday.

TORONTO — Six Challenger-tier tennis tournaments scheduled to be held in Canada this year have been cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.