There are now 15 active cases of COVID-19 in the City of Grande Prairie as of October 4 (Photo: Government of Alberta)

By Shane Clausing

COVID-19 update

Grande Prairie adds eight new COVID-19 cases over weekend, Alberta adds 578

Oct 5, 2020 | 4:10 PM

The City of Grande Prairie added eight new cases of COVID-19 between Friday and Sunday, while a total of 578 new cases were added province-wide over that time span.

There are now 15 active cases of COVID-19 as of Sunday in the Swan City, while two new cases were identified in the County of Grande Prairie, where there are now four active cases following four more recoveries.

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Elsewhere in the Peace Country, Saddle Hills County added one new case, while all remaining active cases in the County of Northern Lights have switched to recovered.

Updated case totals among Peace Region municipalities as of the end of day October 4 are as follows:

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• City of Grande Prairie: 111 cases (15 actives, 94 recovered, two deaths)
• County of Grande Prairie: 63 cases (four actives, 59 recovered)
• M.D. of Greenview: 16 cases (one active, 14 recovered, one death)
• Birch Hills County: Three cases (all recovered)
• M.D. of Spirit River: 11 cases (all recovered)
• Saddle Hills County: Two cases (one active, one recovered)
• M.D. of Smoky River: 73 cases (63 recovered, ten deaths)
• Big Lakes County: 48 cases (43 recovered, five deaths)
• M.D. of Lesser Slave River: 17 cases (three actives, 14 recovered, one death)
• M.D. of Peace: 26 cases (two actives, 24 recovered)
• M.D. of Fairview: 16 cases (all recovered)
• Clear Hills County: 89 cases (two actives, 86 recovered, one death)
• Northern Sunrise County: Nine cases (all recovered)
• County of Northern Lights: 55 cases (One active, 54 recovered)
• Mackenzie County: 415 cases (14 active, 388 recovered, 13 deaths)

With the surge in new cases (97 on Friday, 263 on Saturday and 218 on Sunday) over the weekend in the province, there are now 1,783 active cases in Alberta.

Alberta’s chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, noted during her COVID-19 update that the greatest area of concern with the rise in new cases is in Edmonton, where they are now talking with local officials about possibly adding more local measures if cases continue to rise.

Dr. Hinshaw also pointed to one concerning trend that Alberta Health has noticed in their data and that is the amount of people who’ve been tested for COVID-19, that are not self isolating and attending work or social gatherings.

“About 11 per cent of cases are attending work or still going to social gatherings when symptomatic while awaiting test results,” said Hinshaw. “This is a significant risk and is one of the factors causing our case numbers to rise. I want to be clear, if you are sick, you need to stay home.”

“We cannot prevent a second wave, or limit the spread of COVID in Alberta, if we do not all take these basic steps.”

Hinshaw also specifically mentioned the upcoming Thanksgiving long weekend, where you should not be going to a family dinner if you are feeling unwell.

Over the weekend, hospitalizations in the province dropped from 64 to 62, while ICU admissions dropped by one to 14.

The North Zone saw a decrease in hospitalizations over the weekend, as three people were discharged. Four people remain in hospital in the North Zone.

The province completed 45,998 tests from October 2-4.

16,872 Albertan’s have recovered from COVID-19, while there were eight new deaths linked to COVID-19 over the weekend in Alberta. A total of 280 Albertans have died from complications related to COVID-19.