Baie Verte MHA talks COVID 'fear' as testing continues, new case numbers expected Friday
CBC
As communities in Newfoundland's Central Health region continue to navigate the province's latest COVID-19 outbreak, officials in the region say an onslaught of new cases is bringing fear to the area.
As of Wednesday, there are 42 confirmed and 15 presumptive cases of COVID-19 linked to Baie Verte and the surrounding area. The region remains in Alert Level 3, with an update on new cases from the Department of Health expected Friday.
"There is fear," Baie Verte-Green Bay MHA Brian Warr told CBC Radio's Newfoundland Morning Friday.
"I guess we've learned to live with it, but in this part of the province I don't know if we've ever had a positive case of COVID-19 within my district…. To have a cluster like this that's happening right now, it's put fear into the people of my district."
Warr said he's especially concerned about viral spread between the 19 communities in the region and a relatively low vaccination rate compared to the rest of the island.
Only 67 per cent of the eligible population in the Baie Verte area is fully vaccinated — the lowest on the island — according to data provided to CBC News by the Department of Health on Sept. 7.
Warr suggested seeing no cases in the region could have led to complacency.