COVID-19 caseload updates by the province will resume on Saturdays and Sundays after 56 new cases were discovered last weekend.
After several weeks of single-digit new case counts, the province had announced earlier in July it would no longer be providing daily briefings. The media strategy was scaled back to news releases on weekdays, with a Saskatchewan Health Authority press conference on Tuesday afternoons and a Ministry of Health press conference on Thursday afternoons. This came after nearly four months of daily briefings which largely said the same things, except with updated case and recovery counts.
However, Monday, July 13 saw a full-scale briefing to announce there had been two new cases of COVID-19 on July 11, but 23 on July 12 and 31 on July 13. This was followed by another full-scale briefing, with Premier Scott Moe at the helm, on July 14.
Ryan Meili, the NDP’s leader, criticized the initial move on July 13.
“Our default needs to be sharing as much information as we possibly can. And that is our call today. Stop the cancellation of giving us case numbers on the weekend and holidays. If we get a big spike on weekends and holidays, people need to know this information. [It] helps people make decisions.”
Moe said on July 14 that at the start of July, the province decided to not report new case number of the weekend because the caseload was relatively stable at that point
“We wanted to give some of our health staff, who've been working very hard, a little bit of a breather on the weekends,” he said.
“But this past weekend, we did have some higher case numbers and it did create some concern. For that reason, and because we want to be as forthcoming with information as possible, and we want to be as transparent as we are able, we will be going back to daily reporting of the case numbers, seven days a week, including on the weekends.”
Moe also noted the increasing numbers over the recent number of days has been quite concerning and should serve as a reminder for Saskatchewan residents to continue with anti-COVID-19 practices.
“We have to keep doing the right things each and every day. The physical distancing, washing your hands, controlling the number of contacts that you come in close contact with. Staying home if you're not feeling well.”
The premier said while an excellent job overall keeping cases, lower and fatalities very low, the province has seen local outbreaks that show how quickly this virus can spread if people let their guard down even for a moment.
“Let's continue to be careful. The risk has not gone away,” he said.
“We have also shown that we can get these outbreaks under control, if we do the right things.”
He commended La Loche and other northern communities’ success in bringing a northern outbreak under control, bringing the active cases in the north to just six.
American border remains closed
According to Johns Hopkins University, on July 14, the United States saw 67,400 new cases, another record after a string of records since June 25. The American new case count from just the past two days, July 13 and 14, was 126,400, exceeding Canada’s total case count of 110,357 since the start of the pandemic.
“Right now, the COVID situation is very, very challenging in the U.S. and it's getting worse,” Moe said. “In Saskatchewan, our case numbers are going up or going up and down, and in the U.S., they just continue to go up and up. So we need to avoid that type of a situation here, so the Canada US border should stay closed to non essential travel for the foreseeable future, at least out to Aug. 21.”
Moe said he fully supports the federal government keeping the border with the United States closed.
July 14 Saskatchewan saw five new COVID-19 cases and 19 recoveries, bringing the active case count in Saskatchewan to 76.
