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(The Canadian Press)
EPI Report

Deaths and confirmed cases of COVID dropping in the province, 50 and over still majority of new cases

Jun 2, 2022 | 4:42 PM

The Ministry of Health’s COVID-19 integrated epidemiology (epi) release reported another 364 confirmed cases of COVID-19 last week. That is slightly lower than last week’s number of 376 new cases.

Just like last week’s report, over half of the cases were among those aged 50 and over.

Nine people who were diagnosed with COVID-19 were also reported to have died last week. This represents a drop from last week’s report of 12 COVID related deaths.

One in 19 laboratory tests was positive (weekly test positivity of 5.3 per cent), which is a decrease from the previous week (5.5 per cent).

There were also 5,667 laboratory tests performed in Saskatchewan reflecting 4.7 tests per 1,000 population. The number of tests was lower than the number of tests in the previous week (6,402).

The Omicron BA.2 sublineage accounted for 76.9 per cent of the variants of concern reported this week, which was lower compared to the previous week. The BA.2 sublineage is more transmissible compared to pre-variant 2020 COVID-19 and BA.1 sublineages but there is no current evidence of increased severity.

There were 29.6 COVID-like illness patients per 1,000 emergency department visits which was higher than last week (17 per 1,000)

There are currently three confirmed COVID-19 outbreaks in long-term care and care home settings.

As of May 28, of the population five years and older, 85.9 per cent received at least one dose of a two-dose COVID-19 vaccine and 81 per cent completed a series.

Among those 18 years and older, 52.5 per cent had received at least one booster vaccination.

More than 21 million rapid antigen test kits have been distributed in the province. They are easily accessible at more than 600 locations.

SHA continues to encourage Saskatchewan residents to get vaccinated against COVID-19.

Vaccination remains your best protection against severe outcomes of COVID-19 infection. From December 20, 2021, to May 21, 2022, unvaccinated people had a three times higher risk of hospitalization and six times higher risk of ICU admission and death compared to three-dose recipients.

Issued Thursdays, the epi report uses multiple data sources and includes laboratory-confirmed cases, deaths, tests, vaccination information provincially and by zones, as well as hospital and ICU census trends and distribution of rapid antigen tests.

The epi report this week looked at data from May 22 to May 28. The hospitalization data is a comparison from May 26 to June 1.

The integrated epi report can be found online at saskatchewan.ca/COVID19-cases.

panews@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @princealbertnow

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