Red Cross asked to help as more Manitobans die of COVID-19

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This article was published 03/11/2020 (1965 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Five more seniors have died from COVID-19 as the disease has taken hold in more than 20 Manitoba long-term care facilities, and two of the hardest hit homes have called in the Canadian Red Cross.

Revera Inc. chief medical officer Dr. Rhonda Collins said Tuesday the company had reached out to the Red Cross and is working with the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority to get more staff at Parkview Place Long Term Care Home and Maples Personal Care Home.

As of Tuesday, Revera reported 39 staff members at Maples, a 200-bed home in northwest Winnipeg, had tested positive for the virus. Two staff had recovered.

“With several staff self-isolating after testing positive, we continue to recruit employees and augment staffing with agency nurses and personnel from security firms to support operations and help keep residents isolated in their rooms,” Collins said.

A total of 118 residents of Maples have been infected with the virus, two have recovered and seven have died from COVID-19, Revera said.

In downtown Winnipeg, the site of the province’s deadliest outbreak of COVID-19, Parkview Place will also benefit from resources provided by the Red Cross. Thirty staff at that facility have tested positive for the virus and 17 have recovered.

A total of 107 residents have tested positive and 23 have died after coming down with the virus. Revera said staffing levels at the home are stabilizing and there are currently 22 active cases of the virus among residents.

Health Minister Cameron Friesen said the provincial government officially asked for federal support through the Canadian Red Cross, in a letter to Bill Blair, the minister responsible for emergency preparedness, on Tuesday.

“Discussions have been ongoing on how the Red Cross can assist Manitobans during the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, and especially in Winnipeg,” Friesen said in a written statement to the Free Press.

“Initially, health system leaders are working with the Red Cross to assess the ability to assist at Parkview Place and Maples Long Term Care Home.”

Canadian Red Cross spokesman Jason Small said details on the scope and scale of support the organization will provide are being finalized. No Red Cross staff members are presently deployed to Manitoba personal care homes, he said.

“We have provided support in long-term care homes, providing staffing support in Quebec, in the past few months in relation to the pandemic,” Small said. “As far as what we’re going to be providing here, we’re still determining whether it will be at that level, or something different.”

On Tuesday, the province reported 103 new cases of COVID-19, including 61 in the Winnipeg region.

A man in his 80s, who was a resident at Maples personal care home, died from the disease; as well as four others from the Winnipeg health region: two women, in their 60s and 80s, and two men in their 80s and 90s, respectively.

The province said 130 people were in hospital with COVID-19, including 20 in intensive care — the greatest number of hospitalizations and ICU admissions since the pandemic began.

The number of deaths due to COVID-19 in Manitoba since mid-March reached 85 as of Tuesday.

Outbreaks are ongoing at 23 long-term care facilities in the province as well as two hospitals.

On Tuesday, St. Boniface Hospital said three more staff members had tested positive following an outbreak connected to three units. Twenty-five patients and five staff have tested positive. Five patients have died, an increase of one since the hospital last provided an update.

At Victoria General Hospital, 41 patients and 37 staff have tested positive for COVID-19.

On Tuesday, Misericordia Health Centre reported a second outbreak: this one in its transitional care unit. The 11-bed unit is part of the Winnipeg centre’s long-term care program, and treats people who require “complex social and medical support” for a limited period of time before transitioning home, to a personal care home or hospice.

Misericordia Place — a long-term care facility on the health centre campus — was managing an outbreak involving 20 total cases as of Tuesday (eight staff, 12 residents) and two deaths, the province said.

COVID-19 outbreaks were also declared in Winnipeg at Fred Douglas Lodge personal care home and Seine River Retirement Residence.

In a letter sent to families Monday, Fred Douglas Lodge chief executive officer Roslyn Garofalo said one employee of the facility had tested positive, and no other staff or residents exhibited symptoms.

At Seine River, an assisted-living facility in St. Vital, a spokesman for operator All Seniors Care said one staff member and five tenants had tested positive for the disease (four are in hospital and the other is in self-isolation with support from the operator). Visitor restrictions were put in place.

The five-day test positivity rate for the province is 8.6 per cent, rising to 9.3 per cent in Winnipeg.

New cases came from all health regions; Interlake-Eastern reported 13, Northern reported 12, Prairie Mountain reported two, and Southern Health had 15.

One case was removed from the totals due to being from out of province, bringing the total number of cases to 6,377.

A total of 2,410 lab tests were completed Monday.

danielle.dasilva@freepress.mb.ca