Active COVID-19 cases in Delta continued to mount last week, drawing to within 10 cases of the highest total since health officials began releasing city-level numbers in early December.
Every Wednesday, the BC Centre for Disease Control releases a map showing the geographic distribution of COVID-19 cases by local health area of residence. The latest weekly map shows Delta had 199 cases for the week of March 28 to April 3, 22 cases more than the week previous.
The number of active cases in the city has been climbing for nine straight weeks — from a low of 59 the week ending Jan. 30 to a previous high of 177 for the week ending March 27 — and last week’s numbers are the second highest since the BC CDC began releasing weekly case totals by local health area. The previous high was the week ending Dec. 5 — the first weekly map released by the BC CDC — with 208 cases.
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The overall number of active cases in the Fraser Health region also increased significantly last week to 3,254 — 433 more cases than the week before. It’s also the most cases since the BC CDC began releasing weekly case totals by local health area. The previous high was the first map, showing 3,139 cases for the week of Dec. 5.
All but two of the 13 local health areas in the region saw increases over the previous week, most notably in Surrey (1,254) and Burnaby (366), which saw their active case counts climb by 101 and 122, respectively.
Also notable was a drop in cases in South Surrey/White Rock, which had jumped from 118 cases for the week ending March 20 to 202 cases for the week ending March 27, before falling back down to 135 last week.
Wednesday’s map release came as health officials reported a 997 new COVID-19 cases in the province over the past 24 hours — 465 of those in the Fraser Health region — and two more deaths, bringing the total to 1,491.
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The BC CDC also released Wednesday an updated map showing the total cumulative cases by local health area from the start of the pandemic through the end of March 2021. That map shows there were a total of 3,337 COVID-19 cases in Delta through March 31, with 614 new cases that month.
The map also shows there were 4, 406 new cases in Surrey in March, and 10,554 new cases across the Fraser Health region. Vancouver Coastal Health, meanwhile, had 5,726 new cases that month.
There are currently no outbreaks at any Delta long-term care, assisted living or independent living facilities, however a number of exposures had been reported on Fraser Health’s website as of Wednesday morning (April 7): English Bluff Elementary (March 30, 31 and April 1), Immaculate Conception School (April 1), Jarvis Traditional Elementary (March 29), McCloskey Elementary (March 29), North Delta Secondary (March 29 and April 1), South Delta Secondary (March 31 and April 1), Sunshine Hills Elementary (March 29), and Southpointe Academy (March 24, 25, 26, 29, 30 and 31).
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.”
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