Additional health measures will be needed to bring the number of COVID-19 cases in Alberta down, as recent restrictions put in place in the past two weeks are not having the results needed to protect the health care system.
On Monday, Alberta chief medical officer of heath Dr. Deena Hinshaw said the latest restrictions, including a ban on social gatherings and imposing restrictions on sports leagues, put the province in a better position than it would have been in without the restrictions, but it doesn't look like they had the level of impact they needed to.
“It’s currently looking like the measures that were put in place two weeks ago are unlikely to be sufficient to bend the curve downward, which is what we have to do if we are going to protect our acute care system,” Hinshaw said.
“I am more concerned than ever before about the spread of this virus.”
The provincial COVID-19 response team is currently looking at what next steps may need to be taken to protect the healthcare system in Alberta, Hinshaw said.
"If the goal is to bring our numbers down, we will need additional measures to be able to do that," Hinshaw said.
This announcement comes after a weekend of high COVID-19 cases, with 1,879 cases diagnosed on Saturday and 1,836 new cases reported on Sunday.
On Monday, the province reported 1,735 new cases.
Currently, there are 20,067 active cases in the province. Since the beginning of the pandemic, 70,301 people in Alberta have contracted the virus.
There are currently 609 people in the hospital from COVID-19, and Hinshaw noted the average age of hospitalization from the virus is mid-60s. One hundred eight people are in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).
In the past 24 hours, 16 people have passed away from the virus, bringing the amount of deaths so far to 631 Albertans.
Yesterday, the province conducted 20,358 COVID-19 tests with a positivity rate of 8.5 per cent.
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