Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry and Health minister Adrian Dix
Image Credit: Province of B.C
November 20, 2020 - 5:06 PM
It’s too soon to say that B.C.’s COVID-19 curve is bending again but, for the second day in a row, the number of new cases is far below record highs set earlier in the week.
There were 516 new cases reported in the last 24 hours in B.C. That’s down from 538 yesterday, Nov. 19, and far below the 762 on Wednesday and 717 on Tuesday.
Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry imposed strict restrictions on social gatherings in the Lower Mainland on Nov. 9 but, in a joint statement issued today with the Ministry of Health, did not point to that as the reason for the decline. Instead, the statement stressed the need to follow the rules that were made province-wide yesterday.
READ MORE: Clarifying all Dr. Henry’s new orders and restrictions for B.C.
"The provincewide orders are about all of us seeing fewer people, having safer workplaces and pausing higher risk activities,” the joint statement says. "The orders on social gatherings and events are to keep our families and friends safe. The best way to do that is to decrease our social interactions and spend as little time as possible with those outside of our immediate household.”
The down side of the news today is that there were 10 new deaths recorded, bringing the provincial total to 331 people who have died.
The 516 new cases brings the provincial total to 25,474. Of the new cases, 294 were in the Fraser Health region, 148 in the Vancouver Coastal, 17 on Vancouver Island 31 in the Interior and 25 in the Northern Health region.
There are 7,122 active cases with 227 people in hospital of whom 57 of whom are in intensive care.
There are 10,002 people under active public health monitoring and 17,477 people have recovered.
There have now been 1,203 cases of COVID-19 in the Interior Health region with 235 currently active. One person is in intensive care in a hospital in the region.
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