By Troy Gillard

MONDAY UPDATE

Central zone down to 20 active COVID-19 cases, Red Deer with six

Sep 21, 2020 | 3:51 PM

Active COVID-19 cases in the Central zone continue to decline.

The latest numbers released by the province on Monday show the zone with 20 active cases, down from 24 on Friday.

The number of active cases in Red Deer is down to six after sitting at nine on Friday.

Red Deer County, Sylvan Lake and Olds each have one active case as of Monday while Ponoka County had three. The map showing the location of all COVID-19 cases in the province can be found here.

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Across the province, there are 358 new cases in Monday’s update – 119 on Sept. 18, 102 on Sept. 19 and 137 on Sept. 20.

The total number of COVID-19 cases across the province stands at 16,739. There are 1,459 active cases, up 35 from Friday, and 15,024 recovered cases, up 322.

There are currently 51 Albertans in hospital, nine in ICU. There have been 256 deaths, up one from Friday.

The province conducted 11,313 tests in the past 72 hours – 12,451 on Sept. 18, 9,748 on Sept. 19 and 12,760 on Sept. 20.

The number of cases in hospital and ICU is an increase from Friday’s update but Dr. Deena Hinshaw said Monday it is well within the health system’s capacity.

“It is good news that our hospitalization numbers have been generally declining or stable since peaking at 93 hospitalizations on July 22,” she said.

The chief medical officer of health sought to provide clarity on what constitutes a cohort. She said a cohort is “a small group who’s members can regularly interact without staying two metres apart. You core cohort is your family or household group and up to 15 other people.”

“This should be the same 15 people at all times, who are all committed to this cohort. And even in the cohort anyone who is sick should not have close interactions with others.”

“Co-workers or attendees of the same church are not considered cohorts, and should maintain distance and public health precautions in their interactions,” Hinshaw emphasized.

Other cohorts will vary depending on the activity, she said, adding sports teams are another version of a cohort, and people you interact with at a child care setting are another.

Hinshaw also said as the number of cohorts are person has increases the chances of exposure also increases.

“Each family and team must determine what level of risk is right for them and what level of risk they deem to be acceptable.”

She said there is currently no plan to raise the sports cohort limit from its current maximum of 50.

There are now 19 schools in the province where outbreaks have been declared. Alberta Health’s threshold for declaring an outbreak in school is two cases being in a school while infectious within 14 days. Two schools are in “Watch” status – St. Wilfrid Elementary School in Calgary and Vimy Ridge Academy in Edmonton.