Brandon mayor defends upcoming Royal Manitoba Winter Fair after event at same site led to measles outbreak
CBC
An outbreak of measles traced to an agricultural fair in Brandon in January has that city's mayor defending the upcoming Royal Manitoba Winter Fair.
The annual event starts March 30 and is expected to attract more than 40,000 people over six days.
"Manitoba has very high numbers [of measles cases]," Mayor Jeff Fawcett said. "It is a reality."
"But I think they can be sourced to parts of the province. That's been made public — we know where those are. Brandon had not had an issue, other than when we had one of our large [agriculture] events."
The provincial government has been reporting measles cases since early February 2025, with the first involving five people from a southern Manitoba household. The highly contagious respiratory virus causes a full-body rash, high fever, cough and watery eyes.
A spike happened when Manitoba Ag Days was held at Brandon's Keystone Centre in mid-January. The event was linked to more than 30 cases.
The Royal Manitoba Winter Fair will be held in the same venue in less than two weeks.
"I'll be at the Royal Manitoba Winter Fair every day, and I look forward to seeing others there as well," Fawcett said as he stood in a crowd of people at a career fair at the Keystone Centre on Wednesday.
He said he chose the location to show his confidence in the city's capability of hosting events.
Since measles appeared in Manitoba early last year, the province now has the highest number of cases in Canada, public health data shows.
Dr. Davinder Singh, a medical officer of health with Southern Health, said he's not happy with "where things are right now." He said he's concerned because thousands of people will be flooding into the Keystone Centre, creating another potential measles spike.
"We've had, up to March 7, 680 cases," Singh said, referring to confirmed and probable cases in Manitoba since 2025.
For the 25 years before that, Manitoba had only 18 cases, he said.
"So, that's how different things are now compared to what we normally see or expect to see," Singh said.
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