Manitoba reports 2,154 cases of COVID-19, 8 deaths since Christmas Day

Manitoba is reporting 2,154 new cases of COVID-19 and eight deaths over the last three days, the province said in a news release Monday.

Of those, a new record-breaking high of 785 cases are from Saturday, 694 are from Sunday and 675 are from Monday.

According to the release, 67.9 per cent of the new cases (1,463) were from the Winnipeg health region. The Southern, Prairie Mountain, Interlake-Eastern and Northern health regions reported 240, 229, 176 and 46 new cases, respectively. 

Chief Provincial Public Health Officer Dr. Brent Roussin has previously said these figures could be underrepresenting the true number of Manitoba's COVID-19 infections in light of long lines at test sites and extended waits for results.

Of Monday's cases, 87 out of 675 are in people not fully vaccinated, who make up 28.7 per cent of the population eligible for vaccination according to the province's online dashboard. Those Manitobans not fully vaccinated, however, are overrepresented in hospitalizations at 58 per cent, and in ICU admissions at 94 per cent.

The five-day test positivity rate is 19 per cent provincially, up from 12.6 per cent on Friday. In Winnipeg, that rate is now 21.2 per cent, the release said — an increase from 14.7 per cent on Friday.

Public health officials believe approximately 75 per cent of all COVID-19 cases in Manitoba are now suspected to be the Omicron variant, the release said.

The province only screens certain samples for Omicron, but in the release said Omicron case data will no longer be provided in bulletins going forward.

Six of the eight deaths reported are among people in the Southern health region: a male in his 20s and another in his 50s on Saturday, a female in her 60s on Sunday and three males — one in his 30s, one in his 40s and one in his 60s — on Monday, the province said.

The death of a female in her 90s from the Prairie Mountain Health Region was also reported Saturday.

On Sunday, the death of a male in his 30s from the Winnipeg health region was reported.

The total number of deaths reported in Manitoba has climbed to 1,378.

ICU numbers disputed

A total of 158 Manitobans are currently in hospital with COVID-19, including 114 active cases.

Twenty-five Manitoba COVID-19 patients are in intensive care, 20 of which are active cases, as well as five people who are no longer infectious but continue to require critical care, according to the province.

However, some doctors are disputing this data, including Grace Hospital's medical director Dr. Heather Smith.

"The ICU physicians on shift meet four to seven times per week to do a real-time patient headcount and discuss potential flow and safety concerns. As of noon today, we counted 40 ICU COVID [patients] —  25 acutely ill and 15 in the no-longer-infectious stage," Smith said.

"I'm told that there is a lot of effort being put into trying to figure out why this discrepancy between the actual and the reported numbers exist."

When asked about the discrepancy in intensive care unit numbers reported by the province, an unnamed spokesperson from Manitoba Health said these are very detailed questions that they won't be able to respond to until Wednesday, "when everyone is back at work," they wrote.

More than 2,500 laboratory tests were completed Sunday. The total number of lab tests completed since February 2020 is 1,259,338. 

The total number of lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Manitoba since the start of the pandemic is 75,717.

New outbreaks have been declared at Kin Place, a personal care home in Oakbank, and Lodge 5 West at Winnipeg's Deer Lodge Centre.