The World Health Organization has declared an end to the swine flu pandemic.

The planet is no longer in Phase Six of pandemic epidemic alert, World Health Organization officials said Tuesday morning following a meeting of the International Health Regulations Emergency Committee meeting in Hong Kong.

WHO director-general Margaret Chan said the new H1N1 virus "has largely run its course."

"As we enter the post-pandemic period this does not mean H1N1 has gone away," she said.

Based on experience with past pandemics, the H1N1 human swine flu virus will behave like garden-variety flu, and will continue to circulate for some years to come, Chan said.

Canada and other countries began ratcheting down their H1N1 efforts in January but WHO held back on downgrading H1N1 until now.

Chan said WHO had a duty to monitor the global situation.

"All in all, now we are seeing clear signals and evidence pointing to the fact that the world . . . is now transitioning out of the pandemic into the post-pandemic period.

"There is no longer a dominance of the H1N1 virus that we saw last year."

Chan said the pandemic turned out to be far less than what was feared a little over a year ago. "This time around we have been aided by pure good luck," she said. "The virus did not mutate during the pandemic to a more lethal form. Widespread resistance to oseltamivir (Tamiflu) did not develop and the vaccine proved to be a good match with circulating viruses and showed an excellent safety profile."

The first cases of human swine flu were reported in Canada on April 26, 2009. Since then 426 H1N1 deaths have been reported in Canada, and nearly 9,000 hospitalizations.

The fall wave of the first flu pandemic in 41 years began in the first week of September, peaked in early November and tapered off by late January.

WHO urged continued vigilance during the post-pandemic period.

OTTAWA — The Conservative government will unveil new copyright legislation Wednesday that is expected to favour entertainment giants over consumers.

Heritage Minister James Moore and Industry Minister Tony Clement decided against using Parliament Hill as a backdrop for the long-anticipated launch and instead are heading to the Montreal offices of video game maker Electronic Arts Inc., a member of a lobby group that is pushing for a hard-line approach to copyright.

The bill will modernize Canada's copyright laws through a series of reforms that will affect everything from what Canadians can play on their iPods to how artists pay their bills.

The legislation will propose to make legal a number of things consumers do already.

This includes allowing people to transfer music from a legally purchased CD to an MP3 player, which goes against current copyright rules. Consumers will also be permitted to record television shows on their personal video recorders, also forbidden under the current law, universally seen as outdated and last updated in 1997.

But, there is likely to be a major caveat that could cancel out these consumer-friendly measures in some instances.

If manufacturers of CDs, DVDs or video games put digital locks or technological protection measures to limit the transferring or sharing of content, a person could run afoul of the law for things such as breaking the code of a DVD shipped from a friend overseas so it can be watched here.

The effect of digital locks could also mean a documentary filmmaker, artist or student who gets around the device to use a video or audio clip for a montage could get into trouble because such digital locks might trump all fair dealing provisions. Fair dealing allows people to make use of copyrighted works without requiring permission in certain circumstances.

"The foundation of the bill will not come as much of a surprise anymore. The government has chosen to side with U.S. lobby interests by introducing restrictive digital-lock provisions that will have a broad impact on how Canadians use CDs, DVDs, electronic books and other devices. I expect we will see some attempts at balance in other areas such as fair dealing — legalizing recording television shows or transferring music from a CD to an iPod seems likely — but these will be undermined by possibly the most restrictive digital lock provisions anywhere in the world," University of Ottawa copyright expert Michael Geist said Wednesday.

The Entertainment Software Association of Canada, of which Electronics Arts is a member, lobbied the government to follow the copyright model used in the United States in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and pushed for a prohibition against circumvention devices that are freely available for purchase at retail stores to allow consumers to crack security locks and upload pirated computer and video games.

Meanwhile, Clement and Moore have already confirmed the Copyright Modernization Act will not modernize the private copyright levy provisions of the law.

The provisions were first introduced in 1997 to allow musicians and other artists to be compensated every time consumers purchase any "blank audio-recording medium," such as blank tapes or discs, to make mixed tapes or CDs of their favourite tracks.

The 29-cent levy, set by an independent board, is currently charged to manufacturers and importers of blank CDs, and passed on to retailers and consumers. The money is then distributed to musicians, record companies and other copyright holders in the form of royalties through the non-profit Canadian Private Copying Collective.

Since 1999, the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists estimates the levy has put more than $180 million in the pockets of more than 97,000 songwriters, musicians and other rights holders. But the group has warned the government that the money is drying up because consumers now use MP3 players to create playlists.

The House of Commons, with the support of the three opposition parties, has passed a motion to tweak the language in the copyright act to allow the levy to be extended to the current generation of copying "devices" — MP3 players.

Clement and Moore have rejected the idea, calling it a "tax on iPods" that could cost consumers an extra $75 to buy an iPod. Instead, the levy on blank CDs will remain in place.

VANCOUVER — A B.C. border guard e-mailed himself the passport details of attractive women who came through his inspection line so he could hit on them later on Facebook, according to an internal government investigation obtained by the Vancouver Sun.

According to the investigation report, the guard's behaviour first came to the attention of the Canada Border Services Agency last October when officials received a complaint from a married female traveller.

The woman told CBSA investigators she came into Canada on Oct. 18, 2009 at around 5 p.m.

Four hours later, around 9 p.m., she received a friend request on Facebook.

Not knowing who the person was, she ignored it.

But the very next day, the same person asked to be her friend again, this time asking why she had ignored his first request.

Beginning to suspect the request might be from the border guard, the woman wrote him back, asking who he was and how he knew her.

"I don't mean to creep you out," he replied, according to the investigation report.

"I met you and thought you were stunning and if you are the person I think you are we kinda shared a chemistry. I thought it might be worth a shot to see if I could find you, but I can't just come out and tell you where or when because if you object to me befriending you I could get into trouble. If it helps the (woman) I met had short blond hair and a gorgeous tall figure with high heels and pants on."

According to the report, the woman was very upset by the incident.

"She felt there had been a gross intrusion into her personal life and that this event had caused a great amount of strain upon her marriage," the report states.

"She further stated that she felt that her security and safety had been compromised from a CBSA officer who had utilized his position to obtain her personal information for his own personal purposes."

After receiving the woman's complaint, CBSA investigators determined that the woman had indeed come through the guard's inspection line on Oct. 18.

Investigators also looked at the guard's computer and found that he had contacted the woman through Facebook.

"On numerous occasions (he had) captured images and names of female travellers he had conducted primary processing on" and then sent the information to his personal e-mail account.

The report does not show exactly how many other times the guard attempted to contact female travellers through Facebook.

His name and his location was deleted from the copy of the report released to the Vancouver Sun.

CBSA officials did not say whether he was still working as a guard.

Yesterday, Martin was asked whether he was angered or in any way upset by the heckling of his goaltender.

"I respect the fans. They pay good dollars to be entertained and they have a right to an opinion," he replied. "As a professional athlete, or a coach, you have to work within the framework.

"Sure I'd like to see better results (for Price), as he would. At the same time, I can't say we lost the game because of him."

And with that answer, Martin badly let Price down.

I expected the coach to rise in some fashion to his goalie's defence. Not necessarily in the guns-blazing manner of former general manager Bob Gainey, who called fans "gutless bastards" for relentlessly booing rearguard Patrice Brisebois during the 2003-04 exhibition season.

But after two strong efforts, this was Martin's opportunity to give Price a public pat on the back, an atta-boy, and to call out the Bell Centre ignoramuses who might as well be attending a monster-truck rally for all they understand about hockey.

Martin could have done so in his own mild way, saying that Price didn't deserve the abuse. That might have been a little too subtle for the loudmouths in the cheap(er) seats, but it would have been a message nonetheless.