Saskatchewan health officials reported eight new cases of COVID-19 in North Central, which includes Prince Albert, on Monday.

This was among a total of 85 cases reported in the province. Over than one-third of new cases are in the 20 to 39 years age category.

Starting Monday, the province will report new COVID-19 cases by vaccination status, according to an SHA Facebook post.

Of the 85 new cases Monday 74 (87 per cent) were unvaccinated, five (6 per cent) were partially vaccinated and 6 (7 per cent) were fully vaccinated.

“The risk of contracting COVID is so much greater if you are not vaccinated. So if you haven’t done so already, get vaccinated,” the post concluded.

Of the 51,390 reported COVID-19 cases in Saskatchewan, 1,038 are considered active.

North Central 2, which is Prince Albert, has 81 active cases. North Central 1, which includes communities such as Christopher Lake, Candle Lake and Meath Park, has 37 active case and North Central 3 has 11 active cases.

Six cases with pending residence information were also added to North Central on Monday.

There were no new deaths were reported Monday. The number of deaths related to COVID-19 remains at 586.

There are currently 71 COVID-19 patients in hospital across the province. There are currently 59 patients receiving in patient care and 12 in intensive care. There are currently 16 patients in hospital in North Central. Of the 71 patients, 53 are not fully vaccinated.

The current seven-day average for new cases is 110, or 9.1 cases per 100,000 population.

Another 90 recoveries were reported on Monday, bringing the total number of recoveries to  49,766.

Since the start of the pandemic, 11,264 cases are from the North area (4,856 North West, 4,741 North Central, and 1,667 North East).

There were 1,209 COVID-19 tests processed in Saskatchewan on Sunday. As of August 16, there have been 987,469 COVID-19 tests performed in Saskatchewan. 

There were 1,116 doses of COVID-19 vaccine administered in Saskatchewan bringing the total number of vaccines administered in the province to 1,447,827

There were 122 doses administered in the North Central Zone reported on Monday. Doses were also administered in the adjacent North East, North West, Far North East, Far North West, Central West, Central East, South West, South East, South Central, Regina and Saskatoon.

According to the province 44,565 people in North Central are fully vaccinated.

655 total variants of concern identified in North Central

There are 655 confirmed variants of concern (VOC) cases identified by the province in the North Central zone as of August 15.

This was among 12,415 variants of concern identified by screening in Saskatchewan to date. Other regions with identified cases included Regina, Saskatoon, Far North East, Central West, Central East, South West, South Central and South East. There are currently 82 cases with area of residency pending.

There are 86 variants identified in the adjacent North East zone.

Regina led the province with 4,836 identified VOCs.

Of the 8,373 VOCs with lineages identified by whole genome sequencing in Saskatchewan,  7,087  are Alpha (B.1.1.7), 10 are Beta (B.1.351), 439 are Gamma (P.1) and 1,007 are Delta (B.1.617.2).