By Gordon Lambie
On Saturday afternoon, following weeks of steady increases and warnings that the region was on the wrong track, Quebec’s Ministry of Health and Social services announced that the Eastern Townships will be moved to the province’s red alert level as of 12: 01 a.m. Monday, May 10. As a result, a series of new measures will come into effect, including the closing of restaurant dining rooms, the closing of gyms, the cancellation of all extracurricular activities in schools and hybrid in-person/online schooling for students in secondary 3, 4 and 5.
A complete listing of the restrictions for red zones can be found online at https://www.quebec.ca/en/health/health-issues/a-z/2019-coronavirus/progressive-regional-alert-and-intervention-system/level-4-maximum-alert-red.
The number of active cases in the Eastern townships climbed by 58 over the weekend, going from 495, to 553, with the number of new cases each day reaching levels not seen since January’s lockdown. Of those active cases on Sunday, 208 were in the Granit region (which has been under emergency control measures since last week), 176 were in Sherbrooke, 40 were in the Val Saint-François, 38 were in the Coaticook area, 33 were in the Haute-Yamaska, 20 were in the Memphremagog area, 17 were in the Haut-Saint-François, 13 were in the la Pommeraie area, and seven were in the Des Sources area. Despite the additional lockdown measures, the Granit region continues to be the area of greatest infection in the province in relation to its population. Within the Estrie administrative region, the next most serious area by that measurement is Coaticook, followed by the Val Saint-François.
There were no new deaths in the Townships over the weekend, and changes to the number of people in hospital were only slight, with 34 hospitalizations and five in intensive care.
The story for the province as a whole, however, was more positive. The daily reports over the weekend were consistently under 1,000 cases, with 919 cases Friday, 958 on Saturday, and 960 on Sunday. As a result the total number of people infected since the start of the pandemic rose to 358,134, but the number of active cases in the province dropped to 8,519. There were 18 new deaths recorded over the weekend, but the number of hospitalizations and people in intensive care dropped to 539 and 124 respectively.
Today marks the beginning of what Health Minister Christian Dubé has taken to calling “the week of the youth” in the provincial vaccination campaign. On Monday appointments open for those aged 30-34, followed by those aged 25-29 on Wednesday, with 18 to 24 year olds coming in on Friday. As of Sunday morning the province was reporting 3,718,074 doses administered across the province so far, accounting for a first dose in 41.9 per cent of Quebecers. In the Eastern Townships 211,634 doses have been administered so far.
