Active COVID-19 cases in Delta dropped to slightly under one per day for the week ending June 26.
Every Wednesday, the BC Centre for Disease Control releases a map showing the geographic distribution of COVID-19 cases by local health area (LHA) of residence. The latest weekly map shows Delta had 6 cases for the week of June 20 to 26, 15 fewer than the week previous.
Delta’s case total has fallen for 10 of the last 11 weeks, only adding 28 cases the week ending May 1. Previous to that, the numbers had been climbing for 10 straight weeks before hitting a record high of 262 the week ending April 10.
Last week’s total marked the lowest number of active COVID-19 cases in Delta since health officials began releasing city-level data in December.
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The overall number of active cases in the Fraser Health region decreased for the tenth straight week to 212, down 69 from the week previous and the lowest total since the BC CDC began releasing the weekly LHA maps in December of last year. Last week also marked a month since weekly active case numbers for the region fell below 1,000.
Eight of the 13 local health areas in the Fraser Health region saw decreases from the previous week, with Agassiz-Harrison maintaining its case count of one from the week previous. South Surrey/White Rock also had zero active cases for the second week in a row.
Other than Delta, the most notable decrease was in Abbotsford, which had 29 cases — 21 fewer than the week previous. All other LHA’s decreases were in the single digits, between five and eight.
Chilliwack, Mission and Hope added six cases between them. Chilliwack had 30 cases (up three), Mission had nine (up one) and Hope had two (up two).
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More recently, data shared on the BC CDC’s COVID-19 Surveillance Dashboard, Delta had an overall daily average of one new cases per 100,000 people for the week of June 25- to July 1, down from two the weeks before.
Broken down by community health service areas (CHSAs), that’s one case per 100,000 people in North Delta (down from three) and none in Ladner (consistent with the previous two weeks) or Tsawwassen (down from two the previous week). The CHSA of Tsawwassen is comprised of both the Delta community and the Tsawwassen First Nation.
Delta’s total case count represented two per cent of all cases reported in B.C. that week, down from three per cent the week before. Delta is home to two per cent of the province’s population.
The overall test positivity rate in Delta for the week of June 25 to July 1 was one per cent (down from two per cent the week before), but the rates varied between Delta’s three CHSAs.
North Delta still had the highest rate (two per cent, down from four the week before), while Tsawwassen had the lowest rate (zero per cent, down from two the week before). Ladner, meanwhile, had a test positivity rate of one per cent, after having a rate of zero for the three weeks previous.
Positivity rates were the same when looking only at public tests — two per cent for North Delta (down from four), one per cent for Ladner (up from zero) and zero for Tsawwassen (down from three), making for an overall rate of one per cent (down from three).
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The dashboard also shows breakdowns of vaccine coverage across the CHSAs by age: 12+, 18+, 18-49 and 50+.
As of July 1, Delta leads all other LHAs in Fraser Health with 84 per cent of adults aged 12 and over having received at least their first does of vaccine (up one per cent from the week before). Broken down by CHSA, that is 83 per cent in North Delta (up from 81 the week before), 86 per cent in Ladner and 85 per cent in Tsawwassen (both unchanged up from the week previous).
Limited to adults 18 and over, those rate go up by one per cent across the board, however vaccine uptake is markedly different for those 18-49 and those 50 and over.
For adults 50 and over, vaccine coverage actually fell by one per cent compared to the week previous, both for Delta (90 per cent) and for each of the three CHSAs (89 for North Delta, 91 for Ladner and 90 for Tsawwassen).
For those aged 18-49 (a category not previously available via the dashboard), vaccine coverage was markedly lower — 80 per cent for Delta overall, 80 for North Delta, 82 for Ladner and 79 for Tsawwassen.
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On July 2, the BC CDC posted an updated map showing total cumulative cases by local health area through to the end of June. The map shows there were a total of 4,907 COVID-19 cases in Delta through to June 30, meaning there were only 92 new cases last month, compared to 488 in May, 990 in April and 614 in March.
The map also shows there were 529 new cases in Surrey, compared to 4,012 in May, 7,043 in April and 4,406 in March, and 1,636 new cases across the Fraser Health region, compared to 8,913 in May, 17,086 in April and 10,554 in March. Vancouver Coastal Health, meanwhile, had 563 new cases in June, compared to 2,833 in May, 7,497 in April and 5,726 in March.
As of Monday (July 5), there were no outbreaks at any Delta long-term care, assisted living or independent living facilities, no public exposure notifications, and no Delta businesses had been temporarily closed due to COVID-19 spread among workers.
Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry announced April 8 that workplaces with three or more people who have COVID-19 and likely transmission in the workplace will be ordered to close, unless it is in the overriding public interest to keep it open. The closure generally last for 10 days unless otherwise determined by health officials.
Meanwhile, Fraser Health’s website listed no exposures at any Delta schools.
Fraser Health defines exposure as “a single person with lab-confirmed COVID-19 infection who attended school during their infectious period.” Two or more individuals is defined as a cluster, while an outbreak describes a situation involving “multiple individuals with lab-confirmed COVID-19 infections when transmission is likely widespread within the school setting.”
SEE ALSO: Ottawa spent nearly $20 million on COVID-19 tracking app — with inconclusive results (July 5, 2021)
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