Posted: Jan 24, 2021 12:31 PM CT | Last Updated: January 24
COVID-19 testing continues at this Brandon testing site.(Jaison Empson/CBC)
There are three more deaths and 222 new cases of COVID-19 in Manitoba on Sunday, the day after the province loosened restrictions in the southern half of the province.
For the second day in a row, more than half of the new cases 116 are in the north, a provincial news release said.
On Saturday, 216 cases of the virus were reported. Of those, 118 were in the Northern Health Region.
Some of the new cases are in Fox Lake Cree Nation, which is battling an outbreak. Although some recoveries are being reported, the First Nation, which is about 700 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg, saw 11 new cases over the past two days.
Closures have affected Gillam s town daycare. (Town of Gillam/Facebook)
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Communities such as Gillam and The Pas are facing their own challenges as they continue to see Level Red restrictions.
Dozens of communities will remain under the strict COVID-19 restrictions in Northern Manitoba. The rest of the province will be easing many restrictions, including removing the essential goods list, on Saturday.
The Pas & District Chamber of Commerce is vocalizing their frustrations with the continued restrictions.
“The North is a broad region, and communities within it should not be lumped together. Restrictions need to be placed on small health districts, rather than the entire region. If we can collect statistics from individual health ‘districts’, then we should be able to ease restrictions on those areas,” President Jill Wilkinson says in a statement.
Photograph By Thompson Citizen files Northern Manitoba posted a triple-digit increase in new COVID-19 cases Jan. 21, accounting for more than half of all the new cases in the province and more than Winnipeg and the other three health regions combined. 105 of 198 new cases of the virus announced by the province on Thursday were in the north, with the Island Lake health district seeing 43 new cases, the Lynn Lake/Marcel Colomb/South Indian Lake/Leaf Rapids health district 16 and the Bunibonibee/Oxford House/Manto Sipi/God’s River/God’s Lake health district 10 new infections. There were also nine new cases in the Cross Lake/Pimicikamak health district, seven in the Shamattawa/York Factory/Tataskweyak/Split Lake health district, five in the Thompson/Mystery Lake health district and four in the Gillam/Fox Lake health district.
Eighteen new cases were reported in the Island Lake health district, where there are outbreaks in both Red Sucker Lake and Garden Hill and there are now 509 active cases overall. There were three other districts with three new cases each, including the Gillam/Fox Lake health district and the Flin Flon/Snow Lake/Cranberry/Shierrdon heath district. Misipawistik Cree Nation at Grand Rapids has 35 confirmed cases and well over 200 contacts in a community of 1,400 people, said Chief Heidi Cook said in a Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak (MKO) press release. “The Rapid Response Team arrived in our community yesterday to do rapid testing for the virus,” she said. “This is a worrisome situation as we don’t have robust health care facilities or a lot of extra spaces for people to self-isolate in our community. The Moderna vaccine does provide some hope that we can at least help protect the elders in our community while we await more vaccines. We hope to start vaccinating our elde
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