COVID-19 cases in B.C. hospitals edge down, cases in critical care jump upward

The number of patients with COVID-19 in B.C.’s hospitals ticked down slightly Thursday, while the number of cases in critical care jumped upward.

As of Nov. 3, there were 286 COVID-19-positive patients in hospital, down from 292 the week prior. The number of cases in critical care climbed to 27, from 20 the week prior, according to the B.C. Centre for Disease Control (BCCDC).

B.C.’s hospitalization model counts all cases in hospital, regardless of their reason for admission.

British Columbia releases a slew of COVID-19 data on Thursdays, however, much of it has become less reliable in terms of assessing the true spread of the virus.

Get weekly health news

Receive the latest medical news and health information delivered to you every Sunday.

Sign up for weekly health newsletter Sign Up

By providing your email address, you have read and agree to Global News' Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.

The BCCDC reported just 486 new cases for the week ending Oct. 29. However, that figure only includes lab-confirmed cases, for which B.C. conducted fewer than 6,000 tests over the same week. Molecular testing has been restricted to the most at-risk patients since December 2021.

The provincewide test positivity rate as of Oct. 29 was 10.8 per cent, down from a mid-October high of 13.5 per cent, and far below the 24.1 per cent recorded at the peak of the first Omicron variant wave.

For the week ending Oct. 29, the BCCDC reported 116 hospital admissions across the province. That data is preliminary, and hospital admissions are typically revised upward by more than 20 per cent the following week.

Assessing the true number of fatalities caused by the virus remains difficult with the data provincial officials provide.

The BCCDC reported 23 deaths for the week ending Oct. 29. That number, however, includes anyone who died within 30 days of their first positive COVID-19 test, a figure officials admit overestimates COVID-19 deaths.

Subsequent review has found an average of about four in 10 deaths reported this way since the spring are actually caused by COVID-19.

Of the 1,498 “COVID-19 deaths” reported by the BCCDC since April 1, 585 (39 per cent) have been found to actually have COVID-19 as their underlying cause, while 162 were still under investigation and 751 were found not to have been caused by COVID-19.

The vast majority (524, or 89.5 per cent) of those confirmed COVID-19 deaths were among people aged 70 and older.

The BCCDC’s latest situation report confirms at least 60 COVID-19 deaths have occurred since Sept. 4, though that number is expected to rise given that the BCCDC says it takes about eight weeks to investigate the cause of death.