Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry sharing the highest COVID-19 count ever in B.C. on Monday, Nov. 16. (Facebook/Gov't of B.C.)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

covid-19 update

Island Heath suffers 41 new COVID-19 cases over weekend

Nov 16, 2020 | 3:16 PM

NANAIMO — Island Health saw the largest number of new cases confirmed over a weekend.

Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry on Monday, Nov. 16 announced 41 new COVID-19 cases were found within Island Health over the three day weekend period, for a total of 381 since the beginning of the pandemic.

The last weekend period ending Nov. 9 saw 12 new cases.

There’s currently 99 active COVID-19 cases within Island Health. The central Vancouver Island area, which includes Nanaimo, has the most active cases at 50. South Vancouver Island has 30 with 19 in north Vancouver Island.

Within Island Health, two people are currently hospitalized with one in intensive care.

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Across B.C., nearly 2,000 new COVID-19 cases were confirmed. These were overwhelmingly found in the Fraser Health region.

“We are in the most challenging of times,” Dr. Henry said. “We have come through a wave, we are now in the midst of our second. It has become even more challenging and the virus is not stopping.”

Around 650 new cases were found each day throughout the weekend period. This is roughly 15 per cent higher than the daily increases seen last week.

Dr. Henry said many of the transmissions occurred in places where social distancing measures had broken down.

“Much of the transmission is occurring in private homes, at social gatherings and in settings like workplaces where people are gathered together, not where we’re having slight interactions in a public setting.”

She said people following the rules and obeying health orders is limiting COVID-19 transmission, which indicates a second provincial lockdown won’t be required for now.

Nine new fatalities were announced, which is the highest number of deaths in a three day period so far in B.C.

“A majority of these people were older, living in long-term care or having underlying illnesses in hospital. We are always struck by the challenges and tragedy of dealing with deaths at this time,” Dr. Henry said.

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