Technical issue to blame for spike of Delta variant cases in Manitoba on Friday: Atwal

Dr. Jazz Atwal, acting deputy Manitoba chief public health officer, speaks at the province's latest COVID-19 update at the Manitoba legislature in Winnipeg Wednesday, December 16, 2020. THE CANADIAN PRESS/John Woods

WINNIPEG -

The province of Manitoba has recorded another spike in Delta variant cases, but one of the province's top doctors says a technical issue is to blame.

The provincial dashboard showed 41 more cases have been linked to the Delta variant (B.1.617.2) as of Friday, bringing the variant's total to 130 cases in Manitoba.

Dr. Jazz Atwal, the deputy chief provincial public health officer, said this increase is due to a technical issue that prevented lab results from being transmitted electronically into the public health information management system.

He said because of this, these cases on the dashboard on Friday were manually entered on June 17, and work is underway to fix the issue.

The dashboard shows of the 130 Delta variant cases, 13 are considered active, and 116 have recovered. One death has been linked to the variant.

Atwal said the Delta variant, which was first reported in India, has the potential to be more transmissible and have more severe impacts on people.

"We will continue to watch the Delta variant carefully, to make sure we are aware of the possible impacts of this variant in Manitoba," Atwal said.

"If Manitobans continue to get vaccinated as soon as possible, and both first and second dose rates continue to increase, we are likely to win this race between these new variants and the vaccine."

READ MORE: Manitoba crosses 1.1M COVID-19 vaccine doses administered; eligibility expands for second doses

As of Friday, the province has linked 14,394 cases to variants of concern – including 1,501 cases considered active and 12,769 cases linked as recovered.

 

Total Variant of Concern cases in Manitoba
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There have been 124 deaths linked to variants.

READ MORE: Four COVID-19 deaths linked to variants in Manitoba, test positivity rate continues to drop

In addition to the new Delta variant cases, provincial data shows the new variant of concern cases identified as of Friday include:

• 63 more cases of the Alpha variant (B.1.1.7.), which has a total of 6,205 cases;
• Five more cases of the Beta variant (B.1.351), which has a total of 57 cases;
• 23 more cases of the Gamma variant (P1), which has a total of 192 cases; and
• 34 more cases have been linked to unspecified variants, which has a total of 7,786 cases. 

 

Variants of Concern in Manitoba
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