Manitoba reported 72 new cases of COVID-19 Sunday, eclipsing the previous record — established just the day before — for the highest daily case total since the pandemic began.
The spike in cases is being driven by clusters on “multiple” Hutterite colonies, but Manitoba’s chief public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin is refusing to say how many colonies have been impacted by the virus.
The grim milestone comes on the heels of the 42 cases announced Saturday — at the time the worst daily total Manitobans had seen — and continues a concerning trend of worsening test-positivity rates that have rocked the province during the past month.
Manitoba’s five-day test-positivity rate currently sits at 2.7 per cent. In the past, Roussin has said if that number hits three per cent, the province may have to look at increased restrictions.
Of the 72 cases announced Sunday, 47 were linked to what Roussin called “communal living communities” where public health officials recently conducted “proactive testing campaigns.”
“The increased amount of testing is indicative of the communities taking this seriously and trying to work with public health,” Roussin said.
“The vast majority of the transmissions we see are from close, prolonged contact, and that includes household members, and so if the nature of your living situation has more close contacts than we’re more likely to see transmission.”
Forty-five of the new cases were from the Prairie Mountain health region, 16 from the Southern Regional Health Authority, nine from the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, one from the Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority and one from the Northern health region.
Roussin confirmed the northern case is not on a First Nations community. And despite calls from First Nations advocates and organizations to tighten travel restrictions up north, Roussin said the province has no plans to do so at this time.
Kenny Wollmann, a member of the Hutterian Safety Council’s COVID-19 task force, said he’s worried the recent uptick in cases could lead to increased stigmatization for Hutterite communities, stressing that the vast majority of them are taking the pandemic very seriously.
But as a “visible cultural minority,” Wollmann said stigmatization is nothing new for Hutterites.
“Cases have always been expected in Hutterite communities since the province began reopening and we’ve been preparing for a day just like today,” Wollmann said.
“The communities are responding well and if a community refuses to respond well we’re confident Manitoba public health has the tools in its toolbox to respond accordingly.”
Since March, the Hutterian Safety Council’s COVID-19 task force has been attempting to educate and inform various colonies on what steps they need to take to protect themselves during the pandemic.
Wollmann said most colonies have been receptive to the task force’s message and have taken concrete action to address the threat posed by the virus. But he concedes — just as in wider society — a minority of people on colonies are skeptical of the idea the pandemic poses a serious public health threat at all.
“We have people who have been very proactive from the beginning and have taken this very seriously. At the same time, we’re dealing with some people who are very dismissive of COVID-19 and think it’s a scheme by somebody designed to do something bad,” Wollmann said.
“We deal with the same variety of responses the rest of society has been dealing with.”
Of Manitoba’s 944 cases of COVID-19, 356 remain active while 576 are classified as “recovered.” Seven people are currently in hospital, including one in the intensive care unit, while 12 people have died.
More than 1,800 tests were performed Saturday and the five-day test positivity rate is 2.7 per cent.
Health Minister Cameron Friesen urged Manitobans to look beyond Sunday’s “large number” of new cases and understand the province cannot be “defensive and changing, broadly, our direction with every hiccup that comes along — we do need to learn to live with the virus.”
With flu season approaching, Roussin said the province is aware it will “see increased respiratory illness.” He suggests employers, and society more broadly, should prepare for “absentee rates that we probably haven’t experienced before.”
Roussin also said Manitobans should not just focus on total COVID-19 case counts. Equally important is the extent to which community spread exists and whether there’s a strain on the healthcare system, he said.
Meanwhile, NDP Leader Wab Kinew called upon the provincial government to mandate mask usage in all indoor public places, as well as certain outdoors public spaces where “you may cross paths with large groups.”
“Manitoba should mandate masks… We need to take strong action now because what we do today will determine how much community spread is happening when kids go back to school in a few weeks,” Kinew said.
“If we don’t do anything now to arrest that spread, it’s going to accelerate right at a time when kids are going back into the classrooms, and they could then become vectors for increased community transmission.”
Twitter: @rk_thorpe
Ryan Thorpe
Reporter
Ryan Thorpe likes the pace of daily news, the feeling of a broadsheet in his hands and the stress of never-ending deadlines hanging over his head.
