A Sun Peaks, B.C., doctor has tested positive for coronavirus.
On Sunday, the Sun Peaks Health Centre confirmed in a statement on the resort municipality’s website that Dr. Chip Bantock had tested positive for COVID-19.
The statement said that Bantock likely contracted the virus through his medical work and has already contacted all patients who might have been exposed.
The doctor is said to be recovering in home quarantine and is expected to return to practice “once he has been cleared.”
News of his diagnosis comes a day after the resort municipality announced the community had its first confirmed case, without specifically naming the physician.
However, Dr. Shane Barclay, the health centre’s medical director, said in a statement that due to testing being limited to certain groups “there are most likely many cases of COVID-19, including here in Sun Peaks, that will not be recorded as an official confirmed case.”
Barclay encouraged people to continue social distancing, telling the public to “assume that you can be exposed at any time while in public and not self-isolating at home — as this is the reality.”
Barclay said Bantock was informed he had tested positive for coronavirus on Friday night.
However, the medical director said his name was not immediately released so that impacted patients could hear the information directly from Dr. Bantock instead of second-hand.
Sun Peaks Mountain Resort Municipality is located near Kamloops in British Columbia’s interior.