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There are now 10 long-term care and retirement homes in Grey-Bruce with COVID-19 outbreaks.
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An outbreak was declared at Maple Court Villa retirement home in Walkerton on Monday.
The other homes in the region with COVID-19 outbreaks includes all three Grey County-run long-term care homes – Lee Manor in Owen Sound, Grey Gables in Markdale, and Rockwood Terrace in Durham – as well as Pinecrest Manor in Lucknow, Errinrung in Thornbury, McVean Lodge in Hanover, RVilla Retirement Living in Ripley, Parkview Manor in Chesley and Maple View in Owen Sound. There is also an outbreak on 6-2, a medicine unit, at the Owen Sound hospital.
Grey-Bruce Medical Officer of Health Dr. Ian Arra has said that the outbreaks are a concern, but they are expected, particularly with the high transmissibility of the Omicron variant which is fuelling the latest surge in cases.
To try to curb the spread in such homes, the health unit is reiterating that all COVID-positive staff isolate for 10 days, not the seven-day exemption in provincial guidelines. That exemption required people to test negative on a rapid antigen test on Day 6 and 7 post-exposure or post-positive. Arra said the exemption is only to be used when all other staffing options are exhausted.
On Tuesday, Arra said there have been situations locally where staff have tested negative on the rapid tests, but those results turned out to be false negatives.
“We need to be very careful in these risk assessments and our team has the capacity to ensure these homes are supported,” said Arra, adding that the many of the residents in the homes are vulnerable to illness and it is important to ensure they are protected.
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Arra said the health unit met with the homes on Tuesday and have put forward a process for them, “ensuring a balanced approach to safety and capacity.”
He said that it is difficult for the operators of the homes who have had to deal with staff shortages even before the pandemic. It is even more difficult now with people isolating because they are sick or a close contact of someone with COVID-19.
“They are doing amazing work during these difficult times,” he said.
According to the health unit’s Situation Report on Tuesday, there have now been 206 cases reported in health-care workers living in Grey-Bruce, up from 180 on Monday.
Local long-term care and retirement home staff and resident COVID-19 cases as of Tuesday included: Errinrung – 15 residents, 18 staff; Grey Gables – 0 residents, 5 staff; Lee Manor – 2 residents, 2 staff; Maple Court Villa – 2 residents, 2 staff; Maple View – 3 residents RAT positive, five staff; McVean Lodge – 11 residents, 4 staff; Parkview Manor – 10 residents RAT positive, 3 staff PCR positive, 3 staff RAT positive; Pinecrest Manor – 0 residents, 3 staff; RVilla – 3 residents, 1 staff; and Rockwood Terrace – 12 residents, 9 staff.
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There have now been 4,673 lab-confirmed COVID-19 cases in Grey-Bruce after 41 new cases were confirmed by the Grey Bruce Health Unit on Tuesday.
The health unit again noted that new cases reported are not an accurate representation of caseloads in the community due to changes to testing in the province.
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Of the new cases, seven were in Owen Sound, five were in Hanover, and four were in Arran-Elderslie. Chatsworth, Georgian Bluffs and Meaford each had two cases, while there were single cases recorded in Huron-Kinloss, Kincardine, Northern Bruce Peninsula, South Bruce Peninsula and The Blue Mountains.
Of the confirmed cases, 302 remain active and 4,341 are considered resolved, according to the Situation Report, which includes case counts and data up to midnight on Monday.
In Tuesday’s report there were seven confirmed local active cases hospitalized in Grey-Bruce due to COVID-19, while two were hospitalized outside the region, both unchanged from a day earlier.
In Ontario there was a reported 3,220 people in hospital with COVID. New data released by the province indicated 46 per cent of those cases were admitted for reasons other than the virus. There were 477 people in the province’s intensive care units with COVID-19, with 17 per cent of them admitted for other reasons.
Ontario reported another 21 virus-related deaths on Tuesday, bringing the provincial death toll from COVID-19 to 10,399.
There have been 25 deaths among Grey-Bruce residents.
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Various media are reporting that Ontario students and staff will be returning to the classrooms on Monday.
Students have been doing remote learning since last week after the Ontario government first delayed the return by two days, and then until “at least” Jan. 17 due to the COVID-19 surge caused by the Omicron variant.
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The return to in-person learning was also dependent on public health trends and operational considerations.
The government said it shipped N95 masks to all school boards and school authorities as of Monday, while some shipments still had to go out to child-care centres this week.
Education Minister Stephen Lecce is set to hold a news conference to make an announcement on Wednesday at 1:30 p.m.
He is to be joined by Ontario Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Kieran Moore.
On Monday, Lecce said in a written statement that the government’s “priority is getting students back to class,” and pointed to recent measures like accelerating boosters for education workers, deploying N95 masks and installing more HEPA air filter units over the last several months.
In another statement, Lecce touted a recent agreement that will allow retired educators to work 95 days instead of 50 this school year, a measure aimed at helping alleviate possible staff shortages during the surge.
On Tuesday, the Ministry of Health released new guidance for child-care centres and schools during the Omicron surge.
Within the guidance it says health units will no longer be dismissing cohorts and any dismissal or closure of a school or child care will be determined by the school board, school or childcare operator.
It also said that due to widespread transmission and inability to test all symptomatic individuals, schools will not ne routinely notifying students in classes with a positive case, or if a student or staff member is absent because they have COVID-19 symptoms.
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The guidance also included new testing guidelines for students.
Anyone who tests positive for COVID-19 – including PCR, rapid molecular, or rapid antigen test – should isolate immediately.
For an individual 12 and older who is partially vaccinated or unvaccinated must isolate for 10 days from the onset of symptom or from the date of their test, whichever is sooner. Anyone who is immunocompromised must isolate for 10 days.
Those 12 and older who are fully vaccinated must isolate for at least five days.
Those 11 and younger must isolate for at least five days from symptom onset and until their symptoms have been improving for 24 hours (or 48 hours if gastrointestinal symptoms are present), regardless of their vaccination status.
All household members of an individual who tests positive, regardless of vaccination status, should isolate while the symptomatic individual is isolating. If they develop symptoms they should follow the isolation directions for symptomatic people, and seek testing if they are eligible.
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The Grey Bruce Health Unit is reminding residents to book their vaccinations with plenty of appointments available at clinics in the coming days.
The health unit is holding vaccination clinics at a number of locations this week, including its large Hockey Hub mass vaccination clinics in Chesley, Owen Sound and Port Elgin. The mass clinics at the hubs are running for a limited time, until Jan. 21.
Everyone aged 12-59 requiring a first, second or third dose requires an appointment at all clinics. While everyone is strongly encouraged to book, those 60 and older may be accommodated for walk-ins depending on clinic capacity, the health unit said.
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There are clinics scheduled for Wednesday in Ripley, Hanover, Owen Sound and Port Elgin, on Thursday in Chesley and Owen Sound and on Friday in Owen Sound and Port Elgin.
Clinics for children age 5-11 planned for East Ridge Community School in Owen Sound on Saturday have now been cancelled, with those scheduled clients to now receive their vaccines at the hub clinics.
Appointments can be booked through the province’s booking portal at Ontario.ca or by calling 1-833-943-3900.
For those 18 and over, booster doses can be scheduled three months after their second dose. Children 5-11 should only receive COVID-19 vaccines at least 14 days before or after other vaccines. Second doses for children age 5-11 must be at least eight weeks after their first dose. Second dose appointments are not automatically booked when booking a first dose.
According to the health unit’s situation report on Tuesday, a total of 322,500 doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in Grey-Bruce, including 15,926 doses in the past week.
COVID-19 outbreak declared at 10th Grey-Bruce LTC/retirement home - Owen Sound Sun Times
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