5 COVID-19 deaths added Thursday in Manitoba; ICU cases up slightly

Manitoba has added another five deaths linked to COVID-19 on Thursday pushing the total to 1,668.

The province also saw COVID ICU cases climb up to 32, which is up from 29 on Wednesday.

However, overall COVID-19 hospital cases dipped to 524 with 222 of those patients still infectious.

David Matear, the health system co-lead of Manitoba's Unified Health Sector Incident Command, said even with cases up in the ICU, the overall trend over the last several weeks is positive.

"The number of COVID positive patients in ICU has declined by almost 16 per cent in the last week," said Matear. "Since Feb. 1, the number of COVID positive patients in ICU have improved by more than 40 per cent.

He said hospitals are still busy but improvements are being seen in key areas.

Manitoba added 319 new cases of COVID-19 and the active case count is 8,538.

The province has stressed that case counts are likely higher because at home rapid tests are not recorded in the total.

The five-day test positivity rate is 14 per cent.

On the vaccine front, 86.2 per cent of eligible Manitobans have received their first dose, 81.8 per cent are fully vaccinated and 43.5 per cent have received three doses.

CHANGES COMING TO WEEKLY NEWS CONFERENCES

Audrey Gordon, Manitoba's Health Minister, was asked on Thursday what will happen to the weekly news conferences that have been held throughout the Omicron wave, as health orders are loosened.

Gordon said news conferences will be held as, "deemed necessary" and noted updates may change in the next few weeks but bulletins will continue.