For the second day in a row, a Saskatchewan resident in their 80s from the South region has passed away due to COVID-19. The province’s death toll because of the novel coronavirus is up to 55 people. There were more new cases reported in Friday’s update from the Ministry of Health, 283, than there was Thursday, 259…yet the seven-day average for new cases dropped a bit from 269 to 262. Three zones had the bulk of Friday’s 283 new cases…Regina with 83, 50 from Saskatoon and 47 from the North Central zone which includes Prince Albert. There are 18 new cases requiring residential information, leaving 85 new cases spread amongst nine of 10 remaining Saskatchewan zones with the Far North Central not having any new cases.

Friday’s update had 183 people recovering from COVID-19, meaning there are 4,116 active cases in the province…126 of which are in hospital, 25 in an I-C-U. Overall, there have been 9,527 reported cases of the virus in Saskatchewan with 5,356 individuals having recovered.

Of the 9,527 cases in the province:

• 491 cases are travelers;
• 4,037 are community contacts (including mass gatherings);
• 2270 have no known exposures; and
• 2,729 are under investigation by local public health.

Overall in Saskatchewan to date:

• 297 cases are healthcare workers; however, the source of the infections may not be related to healthcare in all instances.
• 1,982 cases involve people 19 years of age and under, while the remainder are adults.
• 3,359 cases are in the 20-39 age range; 2,547 are in the 40-59 age range; 1,273 are in the 60-79 age range; and 361 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.
• 55 deaths related to COVID-19 have been reported to date.

Of 9,527 confirmed cases:

• 2,852 cases are from the Saskatoon area
• 1,927 cases are from the north area (692 north west, 916 north central, 319 north east)
• 1,829 cases are from the Regina area
• 1,218 cases are from the south area (475 south west, 431 south central, 312 south east)
• 996 cases are from the far north area (636 far north west, 83 far north central, 277 far north east)
• 659 cases are from the central area (285 central west, 374 central east)
• 46 cases have pending residence information

To date, 357,142 COVID-19 tests have been processed in Saskatchewan. As of December 2, 2020 when other provincial and national numbers were available, Saskatchewan’s per capita rate was 225,891 people tested per million population. The national rate was 312,315 people tested per million population.

On Thursday, 3,504 COVID-19 tests were processed in Saskatchewan.