COVID-19: B.C. reports 752 new cases, nine more deaths

British Columbia health officials reported 752 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday, along with nine new deaths.

The update brought B.C.’s seven-day average for new cases to 685, down from its fourth-wave peak of 754 last Wednesday.

Of the new cases, 297 were in the Fraser Health region, 85 were in the Vancouver Coastal Health region, 164 were in the Interior Health region, 130 were in the Northern Health region and 76 were in the Island Health region.

There were 5,945 active cases across B.C.

There were 350 active cases in hospital, up five overnight, and 136 active cases in critical or intensive care, down eight overnight.

The hospitalization numbers do not include COVID-19 patients who were no-longer infectious, but remained in hospital for other treatment.

6:19 Report released on COVID-19 outbreaks in B.C. care homes details need for sick pay, rapid testing

The province says 88.4 per cent of eligible British Columbians have now had at least one dose of vaccine, and 81.9 per cent have had two doses.

Earlier Wednesday, the B.C. Centre for Disease Control released data showing that more than 30 double-vaccinated people over the age of 80 had died of COVID-19 in September.

However, double-vaccinated people in that age group remained less likely than their unvaccinated counterparts to end up in hospital, the data showed.

No one with two doses of vaccine under the age of 60 died last month, according to the B.C. CDC.

In the past 24 hours, B.C. has conducted 11,235 tests.

Since the start of the pandemic, B.C. has reported 191,124 cases of COVID-19, while 1,992 people have died.