WINNIPEG -- The province is announcing a second COVID-19 variant has been discovered in Manitoba.
On Tuesday as part of the daily COVID-19 bulletin, the province said two instances of the B.1.3.5.1 variant, which was first reported in South Africa, have been found.
An additional one case of the B.1.1.7 variant, which is from the United Kingdom, was also found, bringing the total to six in Manitoba.
All of the variants were found in the Winnipeg area.
The province also announced two new deaths linked to COVID-19. There have been 898 deaths since the start of the pandemic.
One death was a man in his 70s from the Interlake-Eastern Health Region, and the second death was a man in his 50s from the Winnipeg Health Region. His death was linked to the outbreak at the Seven Oaks Hospital Unit 3U 4–7.
Manitoba also added 64 new cases, however, eight previously announced cases were removed due to data corrections. There have been 31,950 COVID cases since March 2020.
Of the new cases, 36 are from the Winnipeg area, 16 are in the Northern Health Region, seven are in the Southern Health Region, three are from the Interlake-Eastern Health Region and two are from the Prairie Mountain Health Region.
The five-day test positivity rate is four per cent in Manitoba and 3.2 per cent in Winnipeg.
There are currently 1,151 active cases and 29,901 people have recovered.
Manitoba has 69 people in hospital who have COVID-19; 11 are in intensive care.
There are an additional 118 people in hospital who have recovered from COVID-19, but still require care, 14 in ICU.
On Monday, 1,307 tests were completed, bringing the total to 527,932.
