Alberta reached a grim milestone on Tuesday as the province’s COVID-19 death toll reached 201.
Five new deaths were reported by Alberta Health on Tuesday. Three of those deaths were related to the Good Samaritan Southgate care centre in Edmonton.
The most recent fatalities related to that outbreak were all women in their 90s.
The other deaths were not related to long-term care facilities. A woman in her 70s in the Central zone and a man in his 80s from the South zone have also died.
There are currently 85 Albertans in hospital with COVID-19, with 23 of those people currently in intensive care.
However, Alberta’s chief medical officer of health said Tuesday that people in the province have taken helpful steps after her warning about coronavirus numbers two weeks ago, even though there is still work to do.
Two weeks ago, Alberta saw a spike in confirmed cases of COVID-19 and Dr. Deena Hinshaw called those numbers a wake-up call.
Numbers reported from the government on Tuesday showed lower daily confirmed cases.
Since Friday, 303 cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed in Alberta. The province recorded 97 cases on Friday, 67 on Saturday, 74 on Sunday and 65 cases on Monday.
“There is no silver bullet that will make any setting completely risk-free and no region or community… is free from the virus,” Hinshaw said. “However, today’s data shows our collective power to take on COVID-19 and limit its spread.
“Two weeks ago, I called our numbers a wake-up call. Today we’re starting to see the result of Albertans answering that challenge.”
Nine regions left the provincial watch list on Tuesday, leaving 14 communities across the province in that category on Alberta’s relaunch map.
Active cases have also dropped significantly. On July 28, there were more than 1,400. On Tuesday, there were 1,191 active cases.
“We still have a long way to go, but these are encouraging signs,” Hinshaw said. “They remind us that we are not powerless in this fight and that working together, we can limit the spread across Alberta.”
Since Friday, Alberta performed more than 34,000 coronavirus tests.
To date, 9,754 Albertans have recovered from COVID-19.