The Ministry of Health has confirmed British Columbia’s sixth presumed positive coronavirus case on Thursday evening.
In a joint announcement, Minister of Health Adrian Dix and provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry stated that a woman in her 30s has tested positive for COVID-19 based on local testing by the BC CDC.
See also: First coronavirus patient in British Columbia has fully recovered
As with the other five confirmed cases in the province, her samples have been sent to the National Microbiology Laboratory (NML) in Winnipeg for confirmation.
According to the health ministry, the woman lives in the Fraser Health region on the mainland and recently returned to Canada from traveling in Iran.
As of the time of publication, international news reports suggest that there are five confirmed cases of the disease in Iran.
Unlike the other five COVID-19 patients in British Columbia, there is no information about whether or not this individual had travelled to or had any contact with anyone from Hubei province, China – the epicentre of the outbreak.
“Fraser Health is actively investigating. The patient’s close contacts will be identified and contacted by public-health officials. The patient is in isolation at home,” reads the official statement.
In an earlier announcement on Wednesday, February 19th, the health ministry confirmed that the first person who had tested positive for COVID-19 in B.C. has fully recovered, three others are now asymptomatic, and the fifth individual is in stable condition.
All six novel coronavirus patients in the province are in isolation and being monitored by health officials.
The ministry continues to reiterate that the risk of COVID-19 transmission within British Columbia remains low at this time.
As of the time of publication, over 2,200 people have succumbed to the disease worldwide, and there are currently more than 76,700 confirmed cases.
