Manitoba hits 6 days in a row with no new COVID-19 cases
Active case count down to 14 after 2 people recover from COVID-19
Manitoba has made it to six days in a row without a new case of COVID-19 being found in the province.
This is the third time the province has hit six days without reporting a new case of the coronavirus since the first case of COVID-19 was announced in Manitoba on March 12, but the province has never made it to a full week.
"Over the past few days, Manitoba's numbers appear to be good, but we need to remain vigilant to keep our numbers low," said Chief Provincial Public Health Officer Dr. Brent Roussin, who smiled as he started Monday's briefing after a week off.
Two more people have recovered from COVID-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus.
On Friday, there were 16 active cases of COVID-19 in Manitoba, but that number is down to 14 on Monday.
A total of 304 people have recovered from COVID-19 in Manitoba; seven have died after battling with the virus.
WATCH | Full news conference on COVID-19 | July 6, 2020:
Roussin said COVID-19 could add difficulty to staying safe during the extreme summer heat that Manitoba has been experiencing recently.
He suggests people pack extra water to stay hydrated when going out, as some stores and public fountains are closed, check the operating hours of cool-off spaces such as malls, and check on seniors.
There were 287 lab tests performed on Friday, 678 on Saturday and 784 on Sunday, bringing the total number of COVID-19 tests done since early February to 66,717.
No health-care worker or first responder has tested positive for COVID-19 in about seven weeks, said Lanette Siragusa, chief nursing officer of Manitoba Shared Health.
The community COVID-19 testing site in The Pas, Man., is moving from the Royal Canadian Legion to 320 Fischer Ave., said Siragusa, but operating hours will remain the same.
Home care services being restored
Earlier on Monday, the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority announced that home care services would be restored through a phased approach starting this week.
The other health regions in Manitoba are also working toward this, Siragusa said during the COVID-19 briefing Monday afternoon.
Home care patients who are Priority 1 or Priority 2 will get their services restored first, Siragusa said. This includes people who need help putting on or taking off compression stockings, dressing in general or preparing meals.
"I do want to remind people that this is not a return to normal. Additional precautions will remain in place to protect clients and staff during home visits," she said.
Asking home care patients COVID-19 screening questions and nurses using personal protective equipment properly are included in those precautions, Siragusa said.
Siragusa was asked by a reporter why it took so long for the services to be restored, given that the COVID-19 curve had been flat in Manitoba for weeks.
"The reason for delay partly is because staff were redeployed to other areas like testing sites and screening," she said. "As we move people around and shift our resources and try to find a balance between living with COVID and getting back to normal, that's part of the process."
Wearing masks in public still not mandatory
Roussin acknowledged Monday that his views on wearing face masks in public have changed throughout the course of the pandemic, but he says they are not mandatory to wear in public because Manitoba has low numbers of COVID-19.
"We certainly don't want the messaging to focus on the usage of face coverings to detract from the importance of all the other messaging: the hand hygiene, staying home when you're sick, the physical distancing," he said. "But it has its place."
If people are in environments where physical distancing cannot be maintained, then it's reasonable to wear a face mask, he said.
Though, ultimately, the masks also have to be worn properly, Roussin added.
"We all see the people wearing the masks not covering their nose, or the mask under the chin, and that carries risks of its own," he said.
"If we're touching our face more often when we choose to wear a mask, that's setting us up for exposure as well," Roussin stated.
All of that said, Roussin said public health officials would continue to follow the research behind face masks, and the messaging around them in Manitoba could change in the future if the COVID-19 curve rises again.
"We want to implement public health restrictions when they're required, because we know if we have them in place too long, you get the compliance fatigue with it," he said.
"It's something that we have at our disposal should we need, but right now we don't see a need to mandate mask use here."
Truckers being stigmatized
Since Manitoba started its economic reopening on May 4, there have been 45 new COVID-19 cases identified — and at least 14 of those cases were connected to commercial truck drivers or close contacts of truckers who tested positive.
Roussin has said on numerous occasions that importation of the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is the main risk to Manitoba's numbers increasing. But he also stated that truckers, who often cross borders as essential workers, should not be treated differently.
On Monday, Roussin said he has personally heard from truck drivers who say they've been turned away from accessing "health-care-related services."
"This is the downside to displaying too much information, we stigmatize groups," said Roussin.
"Truck drivers have been professional, they've been doing their part, they're keeping our supply chains going, getting tested frequently and limiting their community contact," he said. "We're not going to change anything there."
Even when truckers have tested positive for COVID-19, there have been minimal contacts, Roussin noted, and that public health officials will advise people if there are health risks to worry about.
"We're not advising people to deny service to the truck drivers," he said.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
With files from Marina von Stackelberg and Aidan Geary