Nunavut’s total COVID-19 hospitalizations rises to 22
Unclear how many Nunavummiut are currently in hospital
Rapid antigen tests have been ordered for Government of Nunavut departments, municipalities and businesses. (Photo by Mufid Majnun/Unsplash)
The number of people who have been hospitalized because of COVID-19 during the Omicron wave of the pandemic in Nunavut rose to 22 on Wednesday.
The tally of hospitalizations stayed at 19 for about a week before this, and does not represent the total number of people currently in hospital with the disease — that total is unclear.
So far, Nunavut’s chief public health officer, Dr. Michael Patterson, has said the hospitalized cases have come from different communities, without specifying where.
For public health officials to publicly announce which communities hospitalizations are coming from, there would have to be more than five hospitalized people in one community, Patterson said. This is an effort to protect the privacy of Nunavummiut.
Meanwhile, a new drug that can treat COVID-19, called Paxlovid, is in the territory and rapid test kits are on their way.
“Nunavut has received enough Paxlovid doses for the treatment of 100 individuals,” Patterson said on Tuesday.
The plan is to distribute the drug first in Iqaluit, Rankin Inlet and Cambridge Bay, and afterwards in other communities.
“Last that I heard, there were at least two or three individuals who have received Paxlovid for COVID-19 infection,” Patterson said.
A total of 395 active cases were reported across the territory on Wednesday, up by 42 since Tuesday.
There have been a total of 1,237 recoveries and one death since this wave of the pandemic began in mid-December.
Here are Nunavut’s 395 cases by community:
- Arctic Bay — 1
- Arviat — 18
- Baker Lake — 12
- Cambridge Bay — 17
- Coral Harbour — 9
- Gjoa Haven — 1
- Igloolik — 42
- Iqaluit — 123
- Kinngait — 13
- Kugaaruk — 18
- Kugluktuk — 1
- Naujaat — 2
- Pangnirtung — 11
- Qikiqtarjuaq — 1
- Rankin Inlet — 55
- Resolute Bay — 11
- Sanikiluaq — 13
- Sanirajak — 17
- Taloyoak — 30
Public health restrictions are slated to ease in many Nunavut communities on Monday, and changes are being made to the way contact tracing is done in Nunavut to use resources more effectively.
Depending on the status of COVID-19 in a community, people diagnosed with COVID-19 will be asked to notify their own high-risk contacts, and only contacts who develop symptoms will be told to call the territory’s COVID-19 hotline and potentially get tested, Patterson said.
An example of a high-risk contact is being closer than two metres from somebody infected with COVID-19 for 15 minutes without wearing a mask.
Anyone who lives with, visits, or rides in a car maskless with someone who tests positive for COVID-19 in the two days before that person felt ill or had a positive test would also be a high-risk contact.
Patterson is requesting that anyone identified as a high-risk contact immediately isolate for 10 days, whether vaccinated or not.
Nunavut Premier P.J. Akeeagok also announced the Government of Nunavut would distribute rapid test kits to service providers across the territory, including taxi drivers and grocery store employees.
On Wednesday, Sima Sahar Zerehi, Akeeagok’s press secretary, provided more information about the tests in an email. The GN is sending rapid antigen tests to government departments, Nunavut Arctic College, the Nunavut Housing Corporation and Qulliq Energy Corp.
Sahar Zerehi also said test kits have been acquired for all schools in the territory.
Delivery to essential businesses and municipalities started late last week and is ongoing this week, she said.
Here is a breakdown of where the approximately 80,276 tests ordered in February are going:
- Government of Nunavut departments — 42,454
- Nunavut Arctic College — 420
- Nunavut Housing Corp. — 250
- Qulliq Energy Corp. — 1,500
- Qikiqtaaluk municipalities — 6,564
- Kivalliq municipalities — 3,876
- Kitikmeot municipalities — 2,712
- Critical businesses — 15,000
- Gateway airports — 7,500
Municipalities and business owners will be responsible for distributing tests to employees, Sahar Zerehi said.
Is it me or does it seem like we are not getting the full picture about the number of cases in Nunavut?
We don’t know the exact number that are hospitalized either, It just seems like we are more disconnected with our government and not getting the full story and information.
I do hope the ones that are in the hospitals due to Covid recover quickly and don’t have long lasting effects.
Dr. Patterson was asked 2 weeks ago about the vaccination status of the people who are hospitalized due to Covid. He didn’t have that information. Now, thinking logically here, isn’t that information extremely valuable in helping to determine what restrictions and mandates should or should not be used in Nunavut? We are now close to 2 years into this pandemic, knowing the vaccination status of the hardest hit individuals can give us an idea of how well the vaccines are or are not working. I urge the media to keep questioning Dr.Patterson about these details as they would go a long way in helping the public to understand the reasoning behind vaccinations and the restrictions and mandates.
CBC reported the breakdown of numbers for Nunavut residents hospitalized due to covid-19 on February 8th as:
* 10 unvaccinated
* 2 single dose
* 6 double vaccinated
* 1 person’s vaccination status unknown
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/nunavut-covid-update-feb-8-1.6343120
It’s great that the GN finally shared this information. Unfortunately, this number includes Nunavummiut hospitalized “with or for Covid”. The GN really needs to break this down further because mild or asymptomatic cases that are admitted for something else is not very useful and to include them as hospitalized Covid cases is misleading. This incomplete picture they are currently providing is creating fear when it may not be necessary. More transparency will help prevent misinformation, reduce vaccine hesitancy and assure people that public health measures like vaccine mandates are justified by actual data.
First, I can only speak of Iqaluit since its my hometown. Iqaluit has 95% vaccination rate for age 5 and up (as of Feb 15) and yet restaurants, movie theatre cannot open, no team sports, etc. Please stop telling us to get vaccinated if we are still going to have restrictions when the cases go up. It is not a daily case count of over hundreds of cases a day for Iqaluit! This is not “living with the virus”. Plus with the highly transmittable omicron variant, cases counts doesn’t reflect the whole picture, hospitalization does. Yes, vaccination protect, blah blah blah, but right now Nunavut is not evolving in terms of the pandemic measures. Protect the vulnerable and the elderly but let the rest of us live our lives. Many will still be very cautious and that is OK. Keep the mask and vaccine mandate but everything should be open.
For the hospitalization, I would like to see if they are in the south or in territory. If there are 2 people being hospitalized in Rankin, does this mean they are stretched thin in terms of health care there? Or they are not severe but just for monitoring since it has been touted over and over again we do not have the capacity to have covid patients in the healthcare system.
Whenever I go to get groceries at Northmart I am met at the entrance by folks who are not masking half the time. I then go to the aisle to look for my groceries and greeted by a store clerk wearing his mask on his chin, either at Northmart or Ventures!
When is this useless government going to protect us and enforce the law? Just a hopeless, leaderless government we have, who just want to pretend to be nice to all. MLAs do your job during session and make them accountable, remove these useless people!
Just end the restrictions and get back to life as we knew it. Let people decide the level of precautions they want or need to take. Enough of this nonsense. Get back to living. Let the “health experts” admit the vaccine is a failure and stop trying to control people’s lives.