COVID-19

Manitoba's five-day test positivity rate is less than six per cent.

There are 198 new COVID-19 cases in Manitoba, bringing the total number of cases to 69,507.

Out of Friday's cases, 100 people are not vaccinated, 82 people are fully vaccinated, and 16 people are partially vaccinated.

New cases by health region include:

The Northwestern Health Unit has confirmed two new COVID-19 cases in the region. 

One case each was found in the Sioux Lookout and Rainy River Health Regions. 

Follow up with the persons involved and their contacts has started according to protocol. Anyone who is identified as a contact for these cases will be contacted directly.

The newly found cases puts the active case count to 16 in the NWHU catchment area. 

On Friday, the province reported 1,453 new COVID-19 cases, increasing the seven-day average to 1,115 cases, up from 866 this time last week. 

Kenora MP Eric Melillo says he and his party are in strict opposition of the federal government’s proposed vaccine mandate for all remaining federally regulated workplaces.

These new regulations, proposed December 7, would make two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine mandatory for those working in road transportation, telecommunications and banking if passed by the House of Commons. No date on the vote has been set.

“Well, it continues to be a concern for us in the opposition,” said Kenora MP Eric Melillo, in an interview with Q104 and KenoraOnline earlier today.

Leadership with the City of Dryden plans to approve a new mandatory vaccination policy for city staff.

The COVID-19 Vaccination Verification Policy, if passed, would apply to all city employees, including full-time, part-time, permanent, temporary, casual, students, term-contract, volunteer firefighters and members of council.

More than 200 new COVID-19 cases are being announced by Public Health Thursday afternoon.

There are 203 new COVID-19 cases in Manitoba, bringing the total number of cases to 69,314.

Out of Thursday's cases, 95 people are not vaccinated, 100 people are fully vaccinated, and eight people are partially vaccinated.

New cases by health region include:

• 58 cases in Winnipeg
• 53 cases in Prairie Mountain
• 51 cases in Southern
• 28 cases in Northern
• 13 cases in Interlake-Eastern

Staff with the Northwestern Health Unit are reporting one new case of COVID-19 in their catchment area.

Today’s case was reported in the Kenora region. Follow up with the person involved and their contacts has started according to protocols. Anyone who is identified as a contact for this case will be reached directly.

As of December 9, the NWHU is reporting a total of 18 active cases of COVID-19. They include 10 in Sioux Lookout, 4 in Dryden/Red Lake, 3 in Kenora and 1 in Rainy River.

The federal government has introduced legislation to make COVID-19 vaccines mandatory in all remaining federally regulated workplaces.

Mandatory vaccines are already in place for those in the public sector, as well as federally regulated air, rail and marine transportation sectors, travellers on these modes of transportation, and members of the Canadian Armed Forces.

COVID-19 vaccination rates have been updated in the Northwestern Health Unit due to the new population estimates released by Statistics Canada.

The previous estimates that were available were based on the 2011 Census and were much higher than the most recent census data. This has caused the regional vaccine coverage rates to be underestimated up until now.

Ontarians will continue to have access to paid sick days for absences related to COVID-19.  

In a press statement released on December 7, 2021, the provincial government announced that they will be extending the Worker Income Protection Benefit program until July 31, 2022.  

Ontario first introduced the program in April of 2021 as part of the COVID-19 Putting Workers First Act, 2021.  

COVID-19 school status in Cochrane:

Elizabeth Barrett Elementary and Westbrook School are on alert with 2-4 cases.

Cochrane is reporting 30 active cases while Rocky View County is reporting 62.

There were 388 new cases of COVID-19 reported in Alberta on Wednesday, December 8.

Hospitalizations continue to drop with a total of 373 while 68 patients are in ICU.

To date, 89.1 per cent of the provincial population have now received one shot of COVID vaccine while 84.5 per cent are now fully immunized.