There are still no confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus in Manitoba.
The province’s chief public health officer says 97 Manitobans have so far been tested for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus, with no positive results.
“At this time, we are not recommending that the general public wear masks,” Dr. Brent Roussin said Thursday, adding there was no benefit to people who are asymptomatic.
A woman was pulled off a plane last week for a suspected case of COVID-19 in Winnipeg, but she was later confirmed not to be infected.
Roussin said things like sanitizing public environments are not high on the priority list at the moment as there is a limited benefit to preventing the virus by doing that.
“The big message is frequent handwashing, staying home when you’re sick … these are very basic measures but have shown over and over again to work.”
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While Manitoba has not had a confirmed case of the virus, officials are assuming it will reach the province at some point.
“We have to prepare for that. We’re preparing along the continuum of an epidemic,” said Roussin. “We’re in the containment stage, we’re searching hard for that index case.
“But preparedness has to include the eventuality of community-wide transmission.”
Manitoba’s Health Links line has been receiving more phone calls, said Roussin, but he could not give specifics. He encouraged people to call Health Links for the latest information on the virus.
Roussin said public health officials in Manitoba are working closely with the Public Health Authority of Canada and the World Health Organization to monitor the spread of COVID-19.
Mainland China remains ground zero for the COVID-19 outbreak, but several other countries have also reported outbreaks in recent weeks, including South Korea, Italy and Iran.
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