The BC health minister confirmed that the province is entering its third wave of the Omicron COVID-19 variant, as hospitalizations rose 35 percent last week.
A day after Ontario announced its third wave, Adrian Dix said cases in British Columbia also have an upward trend, though not as significantly as hospitalizations.
“We are not seeing a significant increase in critical care in the most serious outcomes for people who are in the hospital and are positive for COVID-19,” Dix said in an interview with the host of the First Edition, Stephen Quinn.
As of Thursday, 369 people are in the hospital with the new coronavirus, including 36 in intensive care, according to the BC COVID-19 control panel.
This represents a 35 percent increase in global hospitalizations compared to last Thursday, when the province reported 273 people hospitalized. The number of patients in the ICU has increased by 12.5% compared to 32 a week ago.
The government says its weekly figures are preliminary. He has been adjusting them retroactively due to delays in the count and the new way in which he measures weekly cases, hospitalizations and deaths.
Health Minister Adrian Dix is attending a briefing on COVID-19 in Vancouver on Monday. (Ben Nelms / CBC)
The figures released Thursday are part of an approach by BC health officials launched earlier this year, both in moving to weekly reports and in how certain metrics are calculated.
There were 24 more deaths from COVID-19 in the province from June 26 to July 2, which includes all people who died within 30 days of the COVID-19 test, whether the virus has spread. confirmed as the underlying cause of death.
Test positivity rates have risen slightly, reaching an average of 9.1 percent across the province on Saturday, compared to 7.5 percent the previous week.
Friday new details on BC immunization plan
Dix did not imply that new public health measures would be implemented to curb the new wave of Omicron driven by the BA.5 subvariant, and said British Columbia continues to focus on immunization as the best defense against VOCID -19, and reiterated that vaccines continue. provide strong protection by making hospitalization five times less likely and death seven times less likely.
“Those others who have been invited have been invited to receive your fourth dose. Get your fourth dose,” Dix said.
A COVID-19 vaccination clinic at the Vancouver Convention Center in Vancouver in January 2022. Health Minister Adrian Dix recommends that people who received two doses of the COVID-19 vaccine receive the its reinforcement the third dose. (Ben Nelms / CBC)
According to the minister, half of those entitled to a fourth dose have already received it.
However, he said, a significant category of people who received two doses but have not yet received a booster should receive their booster now.
The National Immunization Advisory Committee has warned that the respiratory illness season will be a challenge this fall.
“That’s where we hope to be challenged again with COVID-19 and the need for people to receive an additional dose in the fall, no matter how many doses they have received so far,” Dix said.
Health officials also announced a press conference Friday at 1 p.m. to provide an update on BC’s immunization plan. It will be attended by the Minister of Health, Adrian Dix, as well as Dr. Martin Lavoie, acting provincial health officer of BC, and Dr. Penny Ballem, chief executive of the immunization plan against COVID-19 of BC.
LISTENING Health Minister Adrian Dix on the province’s response to a third wave of Omicron
The Early Edition14: 24Minister Adrian Dix: third wave of infections of new variants of Omicron in BC
The provincial government may make the fourth doses of covid-19 vaccines available in the fall. That, as we hear more than a third Omicron wave. We hear from Health Minister Adrian Dix about this.