Hamilton schools reporting 57 COVID-19 cases over 3 days

Hamilton’s two public school boards are reporting a combined 57 COVID-19 cases among staff and students over the last three days.

As of Sunday, the Hamilton Wentworth District School board (HWDSB) says it has new cases with 43 students and two staffers, while the Catholic school board has 11 among students and a staffer over the same period of time.

Last week, Hamilton public schools recorded 64 total COVID-19 cases, with 53 at the HWDSB and another 11 at the HWCDSB.

So far, no outbreaks or class closures have been connected with the new cases recorded between March 21 and March 23.

As of Tuesday, four elementary schools are in outbreaks, according to public health: St. Lawrence Catholic in the north end, Mountview in the west end, Greensville in Dundas and Dr. J. E. Davey in Central Hamilton.

The outbreak at Dr. J. E. Davey Elementary involves cases with three students and a staff member with one person screened positive for a coronavirus variant.

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The school closed this week amid the outbreak due to a staff shortage tied to contact tracing. Students are remote learning but expected to return to in-person classes next week.

Both Mountview and Greensville have also reported cases involving a coronavirus variant, according to public health.

During a city update on Monday, Hamilton’s medical officer of health suggested the large number of cases being reported by the schools is tied to increased caution around the spreading of COVID-19 variants in the community.

Dr. Elizabeth Richardson said contact tracing with variants is more challenging since they spread faster and have the potential to create larger volumes of cases with little contact.

“So you’ll see a number of schools that have had cases where you see large numbers dismissed because we’re very conservative right now around variants of concern,” Richardson said.

“(We’re) trying to contain those as much as possible.”

Richardson said talks are continuing with both school boards on the “best way” to implement further asymptomatic testing at high-risk facilities as part of the Ministry of Health’s return to in-class learning.

The HWDSB oversees 103 schools and approximately 50,000 students. The HWCDSB operates operates 54 schools and hosts close to 29,000 students.

Hamilton reported 80 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday and another virus-related death.

Public health says the deceased was a person in their 70s. The city has now had 301 deaths involving an individual with COVID-19.

Active cases dropped slightly day over day by three to put the city at 713 as of March 23.

There have now been 12,012 total coronavirus cases since the pandemic began last year.

The city’s two hospitals have a combined 106 patients being treated for COVID-19, 87 at Hamilton Health Sciences (HHS) facilities and 19 at St. Joe’s.

There were three new outbreaks on Tuesday at two seniors’ homes and a group home, all involving just a single case.

The outbreaks at Westmount Terrace Retirement Home on the Mountain and St. Joseph’s Villa in Dundas involved just single cases among staff members, the Beth Tikvah Group Home in Westdale has a single case involving a resident.

An outbreak at the West 5th campus at St. Joe’s hospital, which involved just seven staff cases, was declared over after 16 days.

Hamilton has 34 outbreaks as of March 23, which includes 68 total cases among five shelters and 114 cases involving six hospitals.

About 39 per cent (324) of the city’s 830 new cases in the last 10 days involve people under the age of 29.

As of Sunday, close to 71,000 total COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered in the city — about 41,000 through the Hamilton Health Sciences fixed clinic, another 11,000 through St. Joe’s, almost 1,000 at First Ontario and just over 18,000 through mobile clinics.