Northern Village of Beauval coping with COVID-19 outbreak for now

The Northern Village of Beauval, a community of about 750 people, has what it needs on hand to deal with an outbreak of COVID-19 for now.

Beauval's mayor Nick Daigneault said the stress level was high in the village, following Friday night's Saskatchewan Health Authority announcement declaring an outbreak of COVID-19 in the community.

The announcement said there were an "increasing number" of cases in the community, located about 310 kilometres northwest of Prince Albert.

Daigneault said he's confident the community can keep their COVID-19 cases low, which he said the community was prepared to deal with.

He said personal protective equipment was stockpiled in advance and volunteers are in the community ready to go at a moment's notice.

But things could change. He said a higher number of COVID-19 cases would lead to a loss of services in the village.

"If those numbers start spiking, I'm a little worried I'm going to lose my volunteers; I'm going to lose people to fear because they want to stay home and protect their family," the mayor said.

"Then, the systems we have in place will be all for naught at that point, because it requires the people that were setup in place to execute them."

The health authority said an employee at the village's general store tested positive for the virus on Tuesday. Anyone who travelled through Beauval from April 12 to April 27 was asked to self-monitor for symptoms of COVID-19.