Sixty New COVID-19 Cases Means Saskatchewan Total Bolts Above 2,500 With More Than 500 Active

Active cases of COVID-19 surged over 500 in Saskatchewan and over 2,500 in total since the pandemic was declared in mid-March following Thursday’s update from the Ministry of Health. Twenty-one of 60 new cases of COVID-19 are from Saskatoon Thursday with 13 from the North Central zone, which includes Prince Albert. The Far North Central zone was the only one of the 13 zones in the province to not report a new case of the novel coronavirus in Thursday’s update. One of Thursday’s new cases has its location to be determined.

There are 509 active cases of the virus with 2,558 total cases reported in Saskatchewan. There were 22 recoveries reported for a provincial total of 2,024. However, 21 people are in hospital with COVID-19…three of them in intensive care, two in Saskatoon and one in Regina. Ten of 18 individuals receiving inpatient care are in Saskatoon hospital with six in the North Central zone and two in Regina. Two Saskatchewan residents tested out-of-province have been added to the total case counts. One case has been assigned to the North West zone and one case has pending residence location. A death that occurred in April 2020 has been reassigned from Saskatoon to the Far North West zone.

For the week of October 12th to 18th in Saskatchewan there were 84 cases of COVID-19 in schools.
Covid 19 cases broke down like this: Far North West (1), Far North East (8) North West (3) North Central (16) North East (4) Central West (1), Central East (7) Saskatoon (21) Regina (20) South West (1) South East (2).

Of the 2,558 cases in the province to date:

335 cases are travellers;
1,276 are community contacts (including mass gatherings);
682 have no known exposures; and
265 are under investigation by local public health.

Overall in Saskatchewan to date:

82 cases are healthcare workers; however, the source of the infections may not be related to healthcare in all instances.
475 cases involve people 19 years of age and under, while the remainder are adults.
897 cases are in the 20-39 age range; 741 are in the 40-59 age range; 368 are in the 60-79 age range; and 77 are in the 80-plus range.
51 per cent of the cases are females and 49 per cent are males.
25 deaths related to COVID-19 have been reported to date.
There are:
- 559 cases are from the Saskatoon area
- 476 cases are from the south area (228 south west, 211 south central, 37 south east)
- 464 cases are from the north area (159 north west, 207 north central, 98 north east)
- 424 cases are from the far north area (374 far north west, 0 far north central, 50 far north east)
- 349 cases are from the central area (196 central west, 153 central east)
- 284 cases are from the Regina area
- Two (2) cases have pending residence location

To date, 240,203 COVID-19 tests have been performed in Saskatchewan. As of October 20, 2020 when other provincial and national numbers are available from PHAC, Saskatchewan’s per capita rate was 163,966 people tested per million population. The national rate was 235,543 people tested per million population.

On Wednesday, 2,190 COVID-19 tests were performed in Saskatchewan.

Weekly Reporting of Testing Numbers and Cases for Youth

Monitoring the trends of COVID-19 cases in school-aged children, the weekly report of cases and testing numbers for children aged 0-19 with data by age categories and testing positivity rates has been posted for the week of October 12-18 at www.saskatchewan.ca/COVID19-Safe-Schools-Plan. Reports will be published Thursdays.

As of October 18, for those aged 0 to 19 years, 44,269 tests have been performed with 1.0 per cent positivity rate, which is in line with the provincial positivity rate of 1.0 per cent. A total of 431 cases have been identified since the pandemic event began in the province.

0-4 years: 10,449 tests and 83 cases
5 to 13 years: 18,845 tests and 164 cases
14 to 19 years: 14,975 tests and 184 cases