There was no update from the province last week, so there was no blog post last week.
Most other places are engulfed by COVID-19, but in BC it’s much more mellow — right now. Most stats here are up, but only slightly. If you are planning a trip Back East or to the USA, make sure you have good masks.
Workplace
This article (2024-01-04) says that WorkSafeBC fined Alberta-based Horizon North Camps & Catering Partnership a little over $200K after one of their workers was found dead of COVID-19 in a camp by Dawson Creek. The camp apparently had a COVID-19 prevention plan in place… they just ignored it. 🙁 (They did apparently get more compliant after the death.)
Non-COVID Respiratory Illness
Yep, there’s a lot of respiratory diseases going around. From the BC CDC Viral Pathogen Characterization dashboard:
As of the last week of 2023, about ~20% of upper respiratory illness samples are positive for influenza, ~10% is COVID, ~10% for RSV, ~10% for entero- and rhino-viruses, and ~20% for Other (which I presume includes adenoviruses, the four common cold coronaviruses, parainfluenza, etc.).
Statistics
As of 4 Jan, the BC CDC situation report says that in the week ending on 30 Dec there were: +431 reported cases, +101 hospital admissions, +16 ICU admissions, and +11 thirty-day all-cause deaths*.
In the week ending 23 Dec, they now report that there were +383 reported cases, +124 hospital admissions, +14 ICU admissions, and +20 thirty-day all-cause deaths*.
In the week ending 16 Dec, they now report that there were +363 reported cases, +111 hospital admissions, +14 ICU admissions, and +24 thirty-day all-cause deaths*.
For comparison, in the previous update (2023-12-21), they reported that in the week ending on 16 Dec there were: +358 reported cases, +93 hospital admissions, +14 ICU admissions, and +19 thirty-day all-cause deaths*.
*All-cause deaths in people who had a positive COVID-19 test in the prior 30 days, that is.
There were 219 people in hospital and 26 in critical care with COVID-19 on 4 January.
Charts
From the BC CDC Situation Report:
From Jeff’s wastewater spreadsheet:
