The Flin Flon district saw the most cases of any district in the NHR aside from the Cross Lake/Pimicikamak district, where 28 new cases were found. The origins and exact location of the Flin Flon district cases - aside from them being somewhere in Flin Flon, Snow Lake, Cranberry Portage or Sherridon - are unknown. At least one case has been directly linked to a Flin Flon school. Ruth Betts Community School announced March 5 that at least one person at the school had tested positive earlier in the week and was at the school March 2 during a period when they may have been infectious. The person was in the Wolf cohort of the school, which consists of some of the school s Grade 3, 4 and 5 students. A letter was sent out to parents and the public on the school s official Facebook account March 5.
The long, slow ebb of Manitoba’s second wave is continuing, with the province reporting its lowest one-day case increase since October on Monday. Not every community, particularly in the north, has been so lucky.
Pelican Narrows is under lockdown conditions after another surge in COVID-19 cases. The lockdown was first announced Feb. 19 by Peter Ballantyne Cree Nation councillor Weldon McCallum via social media, going back into effect as of 10 p.m. Feb. 21. The community has seen an uptick in COVID-19 cases in recent weeks, going from active cases in the low 10s to as high as 53 cases as of Feb. 22 according to numbers released by the local Angelique Canada Health Centre. Pelican Narrows has also been considered an outbreak zone by the Northern Inter-Tribal Health Authority (NITHA) since November. article continues below
Provincial health officials announced the lowest number of new COVID-19 cases in the Northern Health Region (NHR) that the region has seen in weeks. The district last reported a number that low when 10 new cases were found Feb. 7, the lowest number seen since Jan. 3, where only three new cases were reported throughout the north. The NHR currently has 577 active cases of COVID-19, down from 586 reported Tuesday. Most of the new cases were reported in the current hardest-hit district in the NHR, the Cross Lake-Pimicikamak district. Canadian Armed Forces personnel landed in Cross Lake Feb. 23 to assist in shutting down the outbreak, which has led to a full lockdown throughout Cross Lake and Pimicikamak Cree Nation. There are now 221 active cases throughout the district.
The Thompson/Mystery Lake district reported another 11 cases, bringing them to 74 total active cases - that active case load is down from Thursday, thanks to 13 people now being marked as recovered from COVID-19. The Pas/OCN/Kelsey reported another five cases, but also reported eight recoveries, resulting once again in an active case drop. Only two districts of the NHR - the Flin Flon/Snow Lake/Cranberry Portage/Sherridon and Pukatawagan/Mathias Colomb districts - have zero active cases of COVID-19. Three other districts are down to one active case. For more details, see below. Manitoba reported 90 net new cases of COVID-19 province-wide and two further deaths from the disease, both in Winnipeg. Provincial health officials also confirmed an additional three cases of the B.1.1.7 variant of COVID-19 - the so-called UK variant - in Manitoba. The exact location of the cases was not announced, but the three cases were all considered to be linked to international travel. All th