The province announced a discrepancy has existed in hospitalization numbers on Thursday.
“ It has been determined that there have been discrepancies in previously reported data for acute care hospitalizations and ICU admissions in Saskatchewan. These discrepancies in previous reports were a result of how patients who receive intensive care in a surge bed outside of an ICU were being recorded,” the province said in their release.
There were 193 people reported in hospital on Thursday which was a large increase over the 166 reported on Wednesday.
The province noted that the new data was accurate.
According to the new numbers there are 159 people receiving in patient care with two in North Central. Of the 34 individuals now reported as being in intensive care there are none in North Central.
There were nine cases of COVID-19 reported in North Central, which includes Prince Albert, on Thursday.
This was among a total of 199 cases reported in the province on Thursday. Regina led the province with 115 cases reported.
One case with pending residence information has been assigned to the North Central zone.
North Central 2, which is Prince Albert, has 32 active cases.
North Central 1, which includes communities such as Christopher Lake, Candle Lake and Meath Park, has 26 active cases and North Central 3 has 18 active cases.
There were no deaths related to COVID-19 reported Thursday.The number of deaths related to COVID-19 in the province is currently 436.
The current seven-day average 206, or 16.8 cases per 100,000 population.
Of the 33,789 reported COVID-19 cases in Saskatchewan, 1,949 are considered active.
The recovered number now sits at 31,404 after 205 more recoveries were reported.
The total number of cases since the beginning of the pandemic is 33,789 of those 8,104 cases are from the North area (3,275 North West, 3,507 North Central and 1,322 North East).
There were 3,982 COVID-19 tests processed in Saskatchewan on March 31.
As of today there have been 669,431 COVID-19 tests performed in Saskatchewan.
There were 7,706 doses of COVID-19 vaccine administered yesterday in Saskatchewan bringing the total number of vaccines administered in the province to 200,633.
There were 48 doses administered in the North Central reported. Doses were also administered in the adjacent North East, Far North West, Far North East, Central West, Central East, South Central, South East, South West, Saskatoon and Regina.
The COVID-19 vaccine appointment booking system will expand to include residents 58 years of age and older, effective Friday, April 2. Eligible residents are encouraged to book their COVID-19 vaccinations and can do so online or by phone.
According to the province as of April 1 one fifth of Saskatchewan residents in their 80s have now received their second dose of vaccine and are fully vaccinated.
The AstraZeneca shipment from the United States arrived Thursday and the shipments are en route to Prince Albert, Regina, Saskatoon and North Battleford. A Moderna shipment is expected the week of April 12.
Nine more variants of concern identified in North Central
There were six confirmed variants of concern (VOC) cases identified by the province in the North Central zone, which includes Prince Albert, on March 31. This follows four identified March 29 and an additional six identified March 30.
This was among 1,682 variants of concern identified by screening in Saskatchewan. Other regions with identified cases included Regina, Saskatoon, Far North East, Central West, Central East, South West, South Central and South East.
Regina led the province with 1,348 identified.
These have previously been reported as “presumptive positives” but all screening tests will be considered confirmed VOCs for the purposes of public reporting and contact investigations.
There were 395 new lineage results reported today. Of the 890 VOCs with lineages identified by whole genome sequencing in Saskatchewan, 882are B1.1.1.7 (UK) and eight are B1.351 (SA).
The Regina zone accounts for 744 (or 84 per cent) of the VOC cases with confirmed lineage reported in Saskatchewan.
Five VOC WGS results (South Central-2, Regina-2, Saskatoon-1) previously reported were found to be duplicate tests and have been removed from the counts.
Please note that these VOC may have been initially identified via means other than screening (i.e. selection for whole genome sequencing without screening) and that whole genome sequencing results to identify lineage are included in the screening results.”
The province has also noted VOC are beginning to rise across southern Saskatchewan particularly in the Moose Jaw and Weyburn areas and residents are urged to adhere to best personal protective measures.
