There are no new cases of COVID-19 today and there have been three recoveries all in Iqaluit. This follows a recent increased downward trend over the past few days.
“While I’m happy to see our active case counts decrease this weekend, it is really, really important that we do not lose focus or use this as any kind of excuse to ease the hard work that we are doing,” said Premier Joe Savikataaq.
“We know how quickly this virus spreads and how quickly it can turn into an outbreak, there are almost no justifications to break current measures.”
Over the weekend, one new case in Kinngait was identified. This was linked to previously identified cases and no changes in the public health measures in the community were needed.
“On Saturday we announced a new positive case in Kinngait, this case was found through surveillance testing and is a result of household transmission,” said Dr. Micheal Patterson, Nunavut’s chief public health officer.
After a recovery is made, people who live with the recovered case or have been in close contact during the 10-day period where the person was infectious, could still be incubating COVID-19.
“When we get close to the end (of the isolation period), we swab people at that point, in this case we found one case right close to the end of the incubation period, said Patterson. “We did not alter measures in the community because the risk of the virus spreading in the community at large is low at this time.”
There are currently 65 active cases in Nunavut.
There have been 164 recoveries since this outbreak started last month.
Included among the recoveries this weekend were prisoners who were isolated at the Baffin Correctional Centre (BCC), where there are now only three active cases.
“There definitely was some transmission occurring two weeks ago, to the best of our knowledge right now, all of the inmates who acquired COVID-19 were exposed to it before we knew that COVID was in the facility,” Patterson said.
So far 13,304 Nunavummiut have been fully vaccinated with both doses of the Moderna vaccine with an additional 3,409 having received their first dose.
The Government of Nunavut (GN) has also requested a number of doses of the Pfizer vaccine to the Government of Canada, who manages Canada’s vaccine supply to the provinces and territories.
“We have submitted a request for enough doses of the Pfizer vaccine to vaccinate all teenagers in Nunavut and hope for confirmation later this week,”
There’s roughly 4,300 teenagers in Nunavut according to Patterson. Pfizer, much like Moderna, requires two doses for each person so the GN would be looking for at least 8,600 doses to vaccinate all of the teenagers in-territory.
“Once we receive confirmation on the number of doses we will be in a position to plan and implement roll-out for our under-18 population.”
There was also a correction issued by the GN today, there have been three individuals who have been hospitalized due to COVID-19, not four.
Two remain in the hospital and one has been discharged from the hospital.