95 new COVID-19 cases, 3 deaths in Manitoba on Saturday

There are 95 new COVID-19 cases in Manitoba on Saturday and three more people have died after getting the illness, the province says in a news release.

Nearly two-thirds of the new cases 59 are in the hard-hit Northern Health Region, which is dealing with several outbreaks.

Another 31 of the new cases on Saturday are in the Winnipeg health region, the release says, while the remaining new cases are split between the Interlake-Eastern health region (three) and the Southern Health region (two). There are no new cases in the Prairie Mountain Health region.

The deaths announced Saturday are all linked to outbreaks in the Winnipeg health region, including two at the same hospital, the release says.

A woman in her 60s connected to Seven Oaks General Hospital's 3U1-3 unit, a man in his 80s linked to the hospital's 3U4-7 unit and a woman in her 90s at the Actionmarguerite St. Boniface care home have died.

Those deaths bring the province's total to 882.

Manitoba's five-day test positivity rate is now 5.3 per cent, Saturday's news release says, down from 5.7 on Friday. Winnipeg's is now four per cent, down from 4.2.

There are now 206 COVID-19 patients hospitalized in Manitoba, down by seven. Thirty-one of those people are now in intensive care, the release says, up by four from the past two days.

There have still only been four cases of the B117 coronavirus variant, which was first detected in the U.K.,in Manitoba, after three cases were announced on Friday. The first case of the more contagious variant was announced early last week.

All four cases were linked to international travel and have since recovered, officials said.

There have now been a total of 31,329 COVID-19 cases identified in Manitoba, the release says. To date, 29,240 people are deemed recovered, while 1,207 cases are still considered active, though officials have previously said that number may be inflated by a data entry backlog.

There were 1,642 COVID-19 tests done in Manitoba on Friday, the release says, bringing the total number of swabs completed since early last February to 510,542.