1 — covid-19 metrics are worse
on sept. 6, 2020 there were 1,331 active cases in b.c., the rolling average seven-day daily case count was 104, there were 31 people in hospital and 3,765 tests were done with a positive rate of 2.1 per cent.
fast forward to sept. 3, 2021 and there were 5,872 active cases, the rolling daily average was 677, there were 215 people in hospital and 13,356 tests were performed with a positive test rate of 5.7 per cent.
a key difference between these two dates is that in sept. 2020, case counts were driven by the large fraser health and vancouver coastal health regions, while case counts are now driven by the smaller interior health and northern health regions where vaccination rates are lower.
2 — masks are mandated for this school year, unless your child is in grade 3 or younger
at the start of the school year in 2020, the first wave of covid-19 had subsided and while cases were starting to climb slowly masks were not considered to be an integral tool in preventing the spread of covid-19. it wasn’t until nov. 19 that provincial health officer dr. bonnie henry introduced a mandatory mask order for all indoor public settings. this was later lifted, but put back in place two weeks ago when the delta variant continued to drive infection in mostly unvaccinated people in the province.