BCCDC released its latest COVID numbers on Friday. Image: BCCDC

Spelling out how COVID numbers are reported in Trail-Kootenay-B.C.

Trail Local Health Area confirmed coronavirus cases remain at 19

Trail and Greater Area residents are continuing to curb COVID-19 from taking hold in their communities.

The latest data released by the BC Centre for Disease Control (BCCDC) shows that for the week of Jan. 24 to Jan. 30 there were no new cases in town. The Trail Local Health Area – which includes communities from Rossland to the Beaver Valley – has reported 19 coronavirus cases to date, and no deaths.

The last confirmed case – one – was reported between Dec. 27 and Jan. 2, according to BCCDC statistics.

Every seven days, the BCCDC releases local health area numbers from the previous week.

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One scale up from the seven immediate local health areas, is the Kootenay Boundary Health Service Delivery Area.

Statistics for Kootenay Boundary, such as virus case numbers, are a compilation of data from all cities, towns and communities within those seven local health areas. By press time, there was a total of 183 confirmed COVID-19 cases in the Kootenay Boundary health region since the start of the pandemic, encompassing the seven local health service areas of: Trail (19); Castlegar (18); Nelson (72); Kootenay Lake (5); Arrow Lakes (3) ; Grand Forks (8); and Kettle Valley (58).

Monthly, the BCCDC updates cumulative figures from health service delivery areas such as the Kootenay Boundary.

One scale up from the Kootenay Boundary Health Service Delivery Area is Interior Health, or the government authority that oversees the Kootenay Boundary as well as three other health service delivery areas; the East Kootenay, Okanagan, and Thompson/Caribou/Shuswap.

From Monday to Friday, in the late afternoon, Interior Health provides a collective overview of COVID-19 statistics from its four health service delivery areas, which wholly houses almost 800,000 people.

The Interior Health dashboard showed: 78 COVID-19 deaths; total number of cases at 6,569 with 975 of those cases active; 53 hospitalized individuals, with 19 of those patients in intensive care by press time (noon) on Monday.

Of course, the largest scale of reporting is covered weekdays in provincial briefings, often in the late afternoon. These figures are usually released in a live press conference by Dr. Bonnie Henry, Provincial Health Officer, and Health Minister Adrian Dix.

The total cases, infections, and deaths, are first reported as a provincial compilation, then broken down into the five provincial health authorities, which are; Interior Health, Fraser Health, Island Health, Vancouver Coastal Health and Northern Health.

On Friday Henry and Dix reported 471 new confirmed cases since the day previous, for a total of 69,716 cases in British Columbia.

Of the 471 new cases collectively reported; 108 were in Vancouver Coastal Health, 208 were in Fraser Health, 28 in Island Health, 56 in Interior Health, and 71 were in Northern Health.

Of the provincial case tally, there were 4,423 active cases with 253 hospitalized individuals, 70 of those in intensive care. The remaining people with COVID-19 were recovering at home in self-isolation. The B.C. death toll on Feb. 5 stood at 1,246.

By noon Monday, across Canada, there had been 804,000 confirmed COVID-19 cases since the start of the pandemic and 20,767 deaths attributed to this virus.

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