Four deaths, 430 new cases of COVID-19 reported in Manitoba on Saturday

WINNIPEG — The province has reported four more people have died due to COVID-19 on Saturday, bringing the total number of COVID-19 deaths in the province to 1006.

The deaths include two women in their sixties, one from the Northern Health Region and the other from the Prairie MountainHealth Region, both linked to the B.1.1.7 variant of concern.

The other two deaths are from the Winnipeg Health Region, a male in his eighties and a female in her nineties, the latter also linked to the B.1.1.7 variant of concern.

Another 430 new cases of COVID-19 were also announced by the province, with four cases removed due to a data correction, bringing the total number of lab-confirmed cases in the Manitoba to 44,617.

The current five-day test positivity rate is now at 12 per cent provincially and is 14.2 per cent in Winnipeg.

Of the newly announced cases, the majority are in the Winnipeg Health Region with 339. The Prairie Mountain Health Region had 30 cases, 23 were reported in the Interlake-Eastern health region, 11 in the Northern health region and 27 cases were reported in Southern Health–Santé Sud.

The province now has 4,219 people with active cases of the virus with 39,392 recoveries.

Right now, there are a total of 241 people in hospital because of the COVID-19 virus. Of those people 181 have active cases of the virus, with another 60 people in hospital who are no longer infectious but still require care.

There are a total of 70 ICU patients currently in hospital, 51 have active cases of the virus with another 19 who are no longer infectious but still require care.

The total number of variants of concern in Manitoba now sits at 6137, with 2407 of those cases being active. Variants of concern are now linked to 32 deaths.

The total number of laboratory tests completed since early February in the province now sits at 718,020, after 3,515 tests were completed on Friday.

The province also announced the switch to remote learning for all 27 schools in the Red River Valley and Garden Valley school districts because of rising COVID-19 infection rates. This will go into effect as of May 18 and will continue until May 30.