The number of active COVID-19 cases in British Columbia continued to fall Tuesday as recoveries outpace new infections.
Health officials confirmed another 446 new cases over the past 24 hours, while also announcing 615 other patients have now recovered from the virus.
The new cases and recoveries brought B.C.’s total number of active cases to 5,045 — a drop of over 1,000 since Friday.
The province also saw nine more deaths since Monday, bringing the death toll to 1,019.
Monday saw B.C. reach the grim milestone of over 1,000 deaths since the pandemic began. Two-thirds of those deaths have occurred in long-term care facilities, according to provincial data.
There are now 368 patients receiving treatment for COVID-19 in hospital, an increase of 10 from Monday. Of those, 72 patients are intensive care, a number unchanged from the day before.
Of the new cases, 96 are in the Vancouver Coastal Health area and 223 are in Fraser Health. The Vancouver Island region saw 14 new cases, while 67 were in Interior Health and 46 were in Northern Health.
Over 7,200 people are in self-isolation after either contracting the virus or coming into contact with a positive case, the province said.
About 87 per cent of B.C.’s 58,553 cases have recovered.
One new outbreak was declared at Mount St. Joseph’s Hospital in Vancouver’s Mount Pleasant neighbourhood.
Health officials also said a total of 62,294 British Columbians have been vaccinated against the novel coronavirus. Those doses account for close to 90 per cent of what’s been delivered to B.C. to date.