Thursday, March 28, 2024

First new COVID-19 case reported in Vancouver Island Health region since June 22

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At a press briefing on Thursday, B.C. Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry announced one new case in the Vancouver Island Health region.

This was an unusual occurrence for a health authority that has not seen any new cases since June 22, and on June 4 had declared zero active cases for the first time since the start of the pandemic.

In response to questions from Victoria Buzz, Dr. Henry stated that the new test-positive COVID-19 case in the Island Health region was a travel-related case.

The individual who contracted the virus is not related to any local outbreak or cluster. It is not known what part of the island they are located in.

Whether or not a public exposure alert is issued by the BCCDC will depend on when the person travelled, says B.C.’s top doctor.

“As far as I understand, they had a small number of close contacts that are in quarantine now, so I don’t believe there was any concern about travel,” said Dr. Henry.

This new case was reported alongside a daily update that announced 24 new COVID-19 cases and three additional deaths in B.C. between Tuesday and Thursday.

The number of active cases has increased by eight to 160 across the province.


See all the latest updates about the global COVID-19 pandemic on Vancouver Island


Before this new case recorded on June 30, Island Health reported the first new case of COVID-19 since early May on June 22, breaking the region’s streak of no active cases since the beginning of June.

Specific data for the Vancouver Island Health region shows that there have been 132 total cases of COVID-19 in the area and five people have died.

Data from the Ministry of Health shows that southern Vancouver Island has had 47 cases, there were 25 in central Vancouver Island, and 59 in the northern part of the island.

Thus far, there have been 193,752 novel coronavirus tests conducted across B.C., 28,370 of which were done in the Island Health region.

 

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Brishti Basu
Former Senior Staff Writer and Content Manager at Victoria Buzz.

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