A COVID-19 outbreak at Saanich Peninsula Hospital has grown to 10 people — six patients and four staff members — Island Health said Thursday, as provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry announced the province expects to start vaccinating high-risk individuals in B.C. in January.
All four affected staff members are isolating at home, as are three patients, while three patients diagnosed earlier this week were sent to Royal Jubilee Hospital’s designated COVID-19 unit.
The outbreak, declared on Tuesday, is limited to acute-care areas, the health authority said, and enhanced cleaning and contact tracing are underway. While initial patient testing is completed, staff testing continues, it said.
The emergency department and outpatient services, including lab and medical imaging, remain open but the hospital is closed to acute admissions. Patients who need to be admitted will be taken to Victoria General Hospital.
Saanich Peninsula Hospital and West Coast General Hospital in Port Alberni both reported outbreaks on Tuesday, with one staff member and one patient testing positive for COVID-19 at West Coast General.
Island Health has said it hasn’t determined whether the Saanich Peninsula infections occurred in the community or in hospital.
On Thursday, Island Health recorded 10 new cases of COVID-19, out of a total of 694 new cases in the province.
Senior Health Canada officials said Thursday they could be just days away from approving a COVID-19 vaccine, with final documents from the American drugmaker Pfizer expected Friday, indicating when the vaccine will be shipped to Canada. Moderna’s vaccine is expected to receive approval soon after.
Henry said B.C. health officials are already planning to begin vaccinations against the virus in the first week of January.
The provincial health officer expects the province will have two vaccines in January, February and March — one from Pfizer and the other from Moderna.
“Our planning construct is to be ready to start the first week of January and to hope to have everybody done by September of next year,” said Henry.
Initially, there will not be enough for everybody, she said. But vaccines from other manufacturers, if approved by Health Canada, are expected in the second quarter of 2021.
“So, we expect there’ll be a good lot of people who will be immunized by the summer, and through the fall next year, but by the end of the year, anybody who wants vaccine in B.C. and in Canada should have it available to them and should be immunized.”
Vancouver Coastal Health’s Dr. Ross Brown, who heads the province’s vaccine program, and B.C. Centre of Disease Control experts have participated in a “table top” exercise with provincial and federal counterparts to walk through how to facilitate vaccine delivery and anticipate challenges or roadblocks, said Henry.
The vaccines will first be given to people who are most at risk from severe illness, and to health-care workers.
“We know that we will have a limited amount at first, so we won’t be able to broadly achieve what we’ve been calling community immunity, or herd immunity, right off the bat, but that will come,” said Henry. “Our first priority will be to make sure that we’re protecting those who are most at risk. We know that this is our seniors and elders in our communities, and long-term care homes in particular, and in hospitals, here in British Columbia.”
There are 56 active outbreaks in long-term care and assisted living homes — involving 958 residents and 559 staff — and eight in acute care.
Health orders ban social gatherings, require masks in public spaces and ask residents to stop all non-essential travel. There are also new restrictions on adult team sports and contact in sport for kids, on top of an existing ban on all indoor high-intensity fitness activities.
In the past few weeks, 10 to 15 per cent of new COVID-19 cases have been related to physical fitness and sport activities, said Henry.
Asked about delays in posting of new orders after they are announced, Henry said last-minute changes are sometimes needed in wording for legal reasons, and she asked people to be guided by the “intent of the orders.”
New cases reported Thursday include 114 in Vancouver Coastal Health region, 465 in Fraser Health, 10 in Island Health, 82 in Interior Health, and 23 in Northern Health.
There are now 9,103 active cases in the province, with 325 people in hospital, including 80 in intensive or critical care. The province also announced 12 new deaths on Thursday, for a total of 481 in the province to date.
In B.C., 35,422 people have been infected with COVID-19 and 24,928 have recovered.
- With files from The Canadian Press
