By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19)

FRIDAY UPDATE

Red Deer hits 50 deaths as Alberta adds 2,020 new cases of COVID-19

Sep 17, 2021 | 4:26 PM

Red Deer now sits at 680 active cases of COVID-19, up 86 from Thursday, and up from 495 a week ago.

That’s the highest active caseload in the city since May 16. The city peaked at 911 active cases on May 8.

Meantime, the city’s total number of recorded cases is up 151 to 7,141 over the last day, while recoveries are up 63 to 6,411.

Red Deer’s death toll stemming from COVID-19 is now 50, with two reported today.

LOOK-BACK: On this day one year ago, there were 103 total cases of COVID-19 recorded in the city (+8 over the previous week), with 8 active (-9) and zero deaths.

Seven stops

CPKC Holiday Train returns to Central Alberta on Dec. 11

2h ago

ANNUAL LIGHT THE HOUSE EVENT

Ronald McDonald House lights up with holiday cheer for 2024

18h ago

enviro container

Red Deer-area company fined $12,000 for Water Act violation

21h ago

RELATED: State of local emergency renewed in Red Deer due to COVID-19

Active cases across Central Zone (one-day change)

Red Deer County: 287 (+50)

Sylvan Lake: 129 (+24)

Lacombe County: 179 (+29)

Lacombe: 111 (+13)

Ponoka County: 240 (+29)

Brazeau County: 213 (+35)

Clearwater County: 242 (+26)

Mountain View County: 159 (+6)

Olds: 92 (-7)

Kneehill County: 61 (+6)

County of Stettler: 100 (+17)

The Central Zone as a whole has 3,080 active cases as of Friday, up 322 from Thursday. There are 155 hospitalizations, up eight, with 20 people receiving intensive care at Red Deer Regional Hospital, down one. The Central Zone has had 208 deaths linked to COVID-19, with six reported today.

The zone’s one-day positivity rate for Sept. 16 is 24.69 per cent with 2,272 tests done. That is an all-time/pandemic record for the zone’s positivity rate. North Zone is the only other zone to ever hit that mark.

PROVINCIAL NUMBERS

Across Alberta, another 2,020 new cases of COVID-19 were announced Friday out of 17,327 tests. That makes for a seven-day positivity rate of 11.56 per cent.

Of today’s new cases, about 70 per cent are unvaccinated.

Active cases across the province are up 495 to 19,201. A week ago, active cases totalled 13,625.

By age:

Under 1: 115
1-4: 727
5-9: 1461
10-19: 2832
20-29: 3226
30-39: 3643
40-49: 2766
50-59: 1863
60-69: 1297
70-79: 705
80+: 560

There are 911 Albertans hospitalized due to the virus, up 15, including 215 in intensive care, down seven.

Of the 696 not in ICU, 465 are unvaccinated, 43 have one dose, and 188 have two doses.

Of the 215 in ICU, 193 are unvaccinated, five have one dose, and 17 have two doses.

The province’s death toll is now listed as 2,523, which means 18 more deaths have been reported since yesterday, and up 79 over the last week.

VACCINATIONS

Across the province, 80.1 per cent of Alberta’s eligible 12+ population has received at least one dose (68.1% total population), and 71.8 per cent of those eligible are fully vaccinated (61.0% total population).

In Red Deer, 65,436 (71.4% of eligible & 61.5% *total population) people have received at least one dose, up 542 in the last day. Meanwhile, 58,891 (64.2%/55.4%) are fully vaccinated with two doses, up 209. (*Government of Alberta uses a population of 106,395 for Red Deer; of those 91,672 are eligible)