Interior Health (IH) announced 60 new cases of COVID-19 in the region overnight, bringing the total number of cases to 3,124 since the pandemic began.
There are 788 active cases and in isolation. There are 31 people in hospital with nine in intensive care.
The total number of deaths due to the virus in the region has grown to 10.
According to the health authority, there were additional COVID-19-related deaths at McKinney Place, in Oliver.
“This has been a challenging outbreak for everyone who lives at McKinney, their loved ones, and their staff and physicians who are committed to their care,” IH president and CEO Susan Brown said.
IH announced 16 new cases of COVID-19 linked to the community cluster at Big White, for a total of 76 cases. The resort’s management announced they have pulled passes for non-locals.
Those who are not from within 150 kilometres of Big White have had their holiday passes pulled in an attempt to curb the spread of the virus at the resort.
The health authority’s chief medical officer Dr. Silvina Mema said they are ‘cautiously optimistic’ about the case numbers at the ski resort.
“The reason why the number of tests could be declining is because there are maybe fewer individuals with symptoms, and that’s very good news. But the other reason is that people may be feeling… embarrassed to go to get tested,” Mema said during a media call earlier this afternoon (Dec. 18).
As for other outbreaks in the region, IH said there are 13 cases linked to the outbreak at Teck’s mining operations in the Elk Valley, McKinney Place in Oliver remains at 56 cases and Village by the Station in Penticton remains at four cases in total. Mountainview Village remains at ten cases in total.
READ: Interior Health ‘cautiously optimistic’ following drop in COVID-19 cases, testing at Big White
