Four more health-care workers test positive

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This article was published 22/04/2020 (2056 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Four Manitoba health-care workers have contracted the novel coronavirus and more than 700 have been tested for COVID-19 in the past seven days.

Shared Health chief nursing officer Lanette Siragusa said Wednesday that four new cases of the virus have been identified among the province’s health-care staff in the last week.

Two of the individuals were infected with the virus while at work, Siragusa said, while public-health investigators continue to determine how the other two contacted the contagion.

Overall, 25 health care workers — eight nurses, five medical staff, and 12 allied health and support service employees — have been diagnosed with COVID-19 and 15 have returned to work, Siragusa said. Most of the cases involve workers from the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority. Two were identified in the Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority.

Personal protective equipment had been available to the staff members, Siragusa said, and the individuals were wearing the appropriate gear while at work. Siragusa said she could not describe what level of contact the health care workers had with the public, either during or outside working hours. However, 789 staff members have been tested for the virus in the past seven days.

“It sounded like they were all using PPE and they’re feeling pretty good about the spread, that it probably was very minimal, but they’re doing the contact tracing now and will be able to confirm,” Siragusa said during the province’s daily press briefing.

Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals president Bob Moroz said the number of health-care staff tested in the past week is not surprising as individuals are being swabbed for seasonal sniffles and closely screened for symptoms at their workplace. However, new cases of COVID-19 among health-care workers emphasize the need for all staff to be outfitted with personal protective equipment, Moroz said.

“We know that there are shortages of PPE, we know there are people using PPE much longer than they should for a shift,” Moroz said. “It’s fine to say you have PPE but if it becomes completely ineffective after a certain period of time, in the case of a procedure mask like those being supplied, then is it really PPE at that point any more, or are they checking a box?

“If people have the correct PPE, I’m wondering how it is we’re seeing workplace exposures and workplace positives,” Moroz said.

Meanwhile, chief public health officer Dr. Brent Roussin announced two new cases of the virus Wednesday, bringing the province’s total of confirmed and probable cases to 257. Seven people are currently in hospital — three in intensive care — while 154 people are considered to have recovered from the virus.

Public health officials have tied roughly 53 per cent of the province’s COVID-19 cases to travel, Roussin said, while 35 per cent are close contacts to confirmed cases, and 13 per cent are of unknown acquisition, or considered to be contracted through community transmission.

Roussin reiterated the province’s expanded COVID-19 testing criteria now includes all symptomatic employees and volunteers who are still attending work outside of the home, including those working in construction, transportation, manufacturing, grocery stores and daycares.

“If you are in an industry that was not required to close as part of the public health orders and you’re symptomatic, you are eligible for testing,” Roussin said. “I want to encourage any Manitoban with respiratory symptoms, even if they are mild, who meet our criteria to get tested.”

The expanded testing criteria is key to better understanding the extent of community transmission of COVID-19, prior to relaxing current physical distancing strategies or reopening businesses, Roussin explained.

“We want to ensure that we’re picking up on any community-based transmission prior to opening up our economy,” he said. “We want to make absolutely sure that we are picking up on that, and we know that when you open up the economy there is that chance we’re going to start seeing more cases.

“We’re going to reopen things, we’re going to do so very cautiously, and follow our numbers.”

danielle.dasilva@freepress.mb.ca