COVID-19 can claim the lives of younger people, as evidenced by the person in their 20s from the North West zone who was only of seven people who died Tuesday from the novel coronavirus in Saskatchewan. A person in their 50s in the Central West zone also perished while the other five people to pass due to COVID-19 in Tuesday’s update from the Ministry of Health were in their 80s…four from Saskatoon and one from Regina.

       Otherwise, Tuesday’s update had only 2,438 tests for the virus processed, yielding 194 new cases in 12 of the 13 provincial zones. There were 363 individuals said to have recovered, leaving 4,204 active cases of COVID-19 in Saskatchewan. Of those active cases, 124 infections are in hospital…26 of which are receiving treatment in an I-C-U.

       Only the Central West zone didn’t have a new case of COVID-19 Tuesday with 53 in Saskatoon, 37 in Regina, 28 in the North West, 21 in North Central, 14 in South East, 13 in Far North West, 11 in Far North East, five in both the Central East and South Central zones, two in North East and one new case in each of the Far North Central and South West zones. Three new cases have pending residence information with 12,432 total cases of the novel coronavirus reported since the pandemic was declared in mid-March in Saskatchewan.

Of the 12,432 cases in the province:

• 555 cases are travelers;
• 5,725 are community contacts (including mass gatherings);
• 2,762 have no known exposures; and
• 3,390 are under investigation by local public health.

Overall in Saskatchewan to date:

• 477 cases are healthcare workers; however, the source of the infections may not be related to healthcare in all instances.
• 2,647 cases involve people 19 years of age and under, while the remainder are adults.
• 4,349 cases are in the 20-39 age range; 3,247 are in the 40-59 age range; 1,642 are in the 60-79 age range; and 542 are in the 80-plus range. Confirmation of age is pending for five cases.
• 50 per cent of the cases are female and 50 per cent are male.
• 98 deaths related to COVID-19 have been reported to date.

Of 12,432 confirmed cases:

• 3,671 cases are from the Saskatoon area
• 2,699 cases are from the north area (1023 north west, 1,275 north central, 401 north east)
• 2,493 cases are from the Regina area
• 1,442 cases are from the south area (542 south west, 494 south central, 406 south east)
• 1,312 cases are from the far north area (790 far north west, 93 far north central, 429 far north east)
• 779 cases are from the central area (319 central west, 460 central east)
• 36 cases have pending residence information

To date, 391,410 COVID-19 tests have been processed in Saskatchewan.  As of December 13, 2020 when other provincial and national numbers were available, Saskatchewan’s per capita rate was 242,006 people tested per million population.  The national rate was 336,127 people tested per million population.

On Monday, 2,438 COVID-19 tests were processed in Saskatchewan.

Public Health Measures Effective December 17

For more information on the public health measures that take effect December 17, or to see the Public Health Order, visit https://www.saskatchewan.ca/covid19-measures.