A sixth straight day of triple-digits worth of new cases of COVID-19 in Saskatchewan…and seventh time in the last eight days. As a likely result, Chief Medical Health Officer Dr. Saqib Shahab will announce additional public health measures to reduce the transmission of COVID-19 Friday morning.

Thursday’s update from the Ministry of Health had 111 new cases of the novel coronavirus with only 15 people recovering, upping the active case count in the province to 1,459. Of those active cases, 49 individuals are in hospital…13 in intensive care. Seven of those patients are in Saskatoon, two in each of the North Central and Central East zones and one in each of Regina and the North West zone.

Eleven of the 13 zones reported at least one new case of COVID-19 Thursday with Regina and Saskatoon the only zones in double digits at 25 and 24, respectively. A pending residence case from Tuesday was assigned to Regina while there are five new cases Thursday awaiting residence assignment. Overall, since the pandemic was declared in mid-March, there have been 4,437 reported cases of the virus in Saskatchewan with 2,949 people having recovered and 29 deaths.

Of the 4,437 cases in the province:

• 401 cases are travelers;
• 2,014 are community contacts (including mass gatherings);
• 974 have no known exposures; and
• 1,048 are under investigation by local public health.

Overall in Saskatchewan to date:

• 127 cases are healthcare workers; however, the source of the infections may not be related to healthcare in all instances.
• 900 cases involve people 19 years of age and under, while the remainder are adults.
• 1,641 cases are in the 20-39 age range; 1,242 are in the 40-59 age range; 544 are in the 60-79 age range; and 110 are in the 80-plus range.
• 51 per cent of the cases are females and 49 per cent are males.
• 29 deaths related to COVID-19 have been reported to date.

Of 4,437 confirmed cases:

• 1,232 cases are from the Saskatoon area
• 920 cases are from the north area (302 north west, 446 north central, 172 north east)
• 667 cases are from the Regina area
• 593 cases are from the south area (247 south west, 248 south central, 98 south east)
• 554 cases are from the far north area (452 far north west, 17 far north central, 85 far north east)
• 455 cases are from the central area (203 central west, 252 central east)
• 16 cases have pending residence information

To date, 289,366 COVID-19 tests have been processed Saskatchewan. As of November 10, 2020 when other provincial and national numbers were available, Saskatchewan’s per capita rate was 191,842 people tested per million population. The national rate was 268,615 people tested per million population.

On Thursday, 2,145 COVID-19 tests were processed in Saskatchewan.

Additional Public Health Measures to be Announced November 13

The Saskatchewan Ministry of Health and Chief Medical Health Officer Dr. Saqib Shahab are currently considering additional public health measures to reduce the transmission of COVID-19. These measures will be announced on Friday, November 13 at 11:30 a.m.

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 November 1 to 8 at www.saskatchewan.ca/COVID19-Safe-Schools-Plan. Reports will be published Thursdays.