COVID-19 outbreak declared at Holy Cross High School in Saskatoon

Despite a COVID-19 outbreak being declared at Saskatoon’s Holy Cross High School, classes will continue as normal.

According to the Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools division, the outbreak was declared by the Saskatchewan Health Authority after a person at the school tested positive for the novel coronavirus on Friday.

This is the fourth person associated with the school to test positive for the novel coronavirus within a month.

“According to communication from the SHA, this individual was in attendance while they were communicable early last week,” said a press release from the GSCS.

“We are working with Public Health to inform parents and caregivers, and the SHA is conducting contact tracing.”

Officials say risk of exposure for anyone not considered a close contact remains low.

“Classes will continue as scheduled,” GSCS said.

This is the second outbreak declared at a school. Earlier this week an outbreak was declared at Yorkton Regional High School after a cluster of students tested positive for the virus. All classes have since moved online for two weeks.

On Thursday, the province’s chief medical health officer said parents should get used to “constantly adjusting” to schools’ plans, especially during the fall and winter months when cases are expected to rise as more people move indoors.

“Sometimes a whole class will need to go online. Maybe there will be situations where the whole school goes online for two weeks,” Shahab said.

“This will continue to happen, we’ll continue to monitor, and update the (Safe School Plans) guidelines as needed.”

The Ministry of Health says preventing in-school transmission begins with preventing community transmission.

According to the Saskatchewan Health Authority, an outbreak is declared when two or more people test positive for COVID‐19 and are all linked to a specific non-household setting or event within a specified time period.