Another Nanaimo-Ladysmith school has reported a COVID-19 case, bringing the number of exposures in the district over past week to four.
Island Health says the exposure at John Barsby Community school occurred on Jan. 29.
Bayview Elementary, Rock City Elementary and Qwam Qwum Stuwixwulh School have also reported exposures, which is when a single person with a lab-confirmed case of COVID-19 is at a particular location while infectious.
Possible exposure dates were Jan. 27 and 29 at Bayview, Jan. 27 at Rock City, and Jan. 28 at Qwam Qwum Stuwixwulh.
Island Health joins with school districts to notify any close contacts. Students should continue to attend school unless public-health officials advise differently.
There are 12 schools with a COVID-19 exposure listed by Island Health. Schools remain on the list until 14 days after the last date of exposure.
The central Island remains the health region’s COVID-19 hot spot, with 167 of the Island’s 228 active cases, according to Island Health. The north Island has seven confirmed active cases, while the south has 54.
B.C. reported 414 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday, for a total of 68,780 to date. Twenty-six of the new confirmed cases were in Island Health.
There were also 16 more COVID-19-related deaths, 4,426 active cases and 278 in hospital.
The Fraser Health authority said nine patients in the medicine unit at Burnaby Hospital have tested positive and it has been temporarily closed to admissions.
The emergency department remains open at the hospital and enhanced cleaning and contact tracing has begun.
The outbreak comes just a few days after a COVID-19 outbreak was declared over at the hospital.
Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry and Health Minister Adrian Dix say in a joint statement that businesses need to make sure they are closely following public health orders as the province deals with COVID-19 variants.
“We know the COVID-19 variants make things more challenging as the virus is more likely to spread quickly, which is why we all need to continue to make safe choices,” the statement says.
COVID-19 hot spots also remain in British Columbia’s Interior Health authority, where dozens of new cases have been reported in Williams Lake, Fernie and Big White ski resort.
Bulletins from the authority say there are 37 new cases in Williams Lake, seven more in Fernie and five added to the case count at Big White.
Since Dec. 15, those three communities have been responsible for the spread of over 700 cases.
