By Chris Brown

Increase in hospitalizations expected

Increases in PCR positivity rate and wastewater data being monitored

Apr 7, 2022 | 4:03 PM

Health Minister Jason Copping says Alberta is seeing increases in leading COVID-19 indicators as fears of a sixth wave circulate in Alberta.

He said the wastewater data from March 29 and April 4 show there is more virus circulating in a number of areas. It’s not at the level of the spike seen in later December and early January and in some centres the data is fluctuating in between the extremes of the past few months.

“So it’s a concern and we’re monitoring it closely,” Copping said at a Thursday media availability. “But it remains to be seen how much more increase we’ll see and in particular how that will translate into serious illness and hospitalization.”

Copping said the positivity rate from PCR testing over the same period is about 26.3 per cent, up from 24.5 per cent the week before.

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The weekly update of COVID numbers was provided by the province Wednesday. There are 990 Albertans in hospital, up from 964 in last week’s update.

“We can expect some increase in admissions over the next few weeks but we’re well-positioned to manage it,” Copping said, pointing to a high level of vaccination and that total hospital admissions are within normal spring levels. He said that’s about 90 per cent capacity, similar to the numbers seen in the five years before COVID.

In the Wednesday update Medicine Hat’s seven-day new case rate per 100,000 people is 233.4 on 159 new cases in the past seven days. The previous period’s rate was 148.3 and there were 101 new cases.

In the update, 30 deaths were reported to Alberta Health, an average of just over four per day.

“These deaths and our leading indicators remind us that COVID-19 is still very much with us,” chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw said. “Transitioning to an endemic state does not mean that the virus has disappeared but rather that we have tools to protect ourselves, allowing us to adjust to living with it.”

She said part of living with the virus is continuing to monitor and adapt to emerging evidence.

Also on Wednesday, the province announced it is increasing eligibility for fourth doses of the COVID-19 vaccine and Paxlovid treatment, making additional vaccines available and continuing easy accessibility to rapid tests.

As well, on April 12 Alberta will receive 10,000 doses of Novavax’s Nuvaxovid.

Nuvaxovid is a two-dose protein subunit vaccine that does not use mRNA technology and has been approved for those 18 and older. Due to limited supply, appointments for this vaccine can only be booked by calling 811.

The health minister defended the dismissal this week of Alberta Health Services president and CEO Dr. Verna Yiu. Some have connected it to Premier Jason Kenney’s upcoming leadership review.

“This was really all about the next five years, not the past six years,” he said, thanking Dr. Yiu for her service. “But we have a big job ahead of us in terms of transformation of our system.”

Copping said AHS’s new leader will be tasked with getting surgical wait times down to make good on a commitment the UCP has made.