Almost 900 Sask. students consent to voluntary COVID-19 testing in schools

Saskatchewan has seen almost 900 students consent to be tested for COVID-19 at three high schools.

Testing already took place on Wednesday at Campbell Collegiate in Regina. More testing is underway at Saskatoon's Holy Cross High School on Thursday and Carlton Comprehensive Public High School in Prince Albert on Thursday and Friday.

Of the three schools, Holy Cross High School in Saskatoon saw the largest uptake, with more than half of the total consenting students coming from there.

Saskatchewan's chief medical health officer, Dr. Saqib Shahab, said Thursday thatfrom what he's heard, the testing process "went fairly smoothly."

"This really demonstrates that there's flexibility in terms of how testing teams can be deployed and assist in assessingif there is an issue either in a school or a community, or both," he said.

Scott Livingstone, CEO of the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA), said the voluntary tests were a chance for the SHA and school divisions to work through the process together and workout any potential issues.

"I think we had a good sample of students," he said on Thursday. "Certainly, we didn't expect to get everybody, but it will give us some good work forward to figure out what were some of the challenges for families. They had a lot on their mind as kids went back to school, so maybe that was part of it."

Livingstone said the SHA will now regroup and examine how towork with divisions to best offer the service.

The SHA said in a statement thatin Regina, the more than 250 students consented to a test. In Prince Albert, more than 90 people responded. Both those figures were outpaced bySaskatoon, where more than 550 respondedat Holy Cross.

So far, health officials have recorded single cases of COVID-19 in six Saskatchewan schools, with five of the cases located in Saskatoon, including one at Holy Cross High School.

On Thursday, Premier Scott Moe saidthere does not appear to be any transmission of the virus in Saskatchewan schools, but that with school underway, it's important for people to respect and follow best practices.

"The protocols the schools have put in place are working and I would say they're working quite well," Moe said.

Moe stressed that it only takes one person with their guard down at the wrong time for one COVID-19 case to become dozens.

Derrick Kunz, a spokesman for the Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools, where five of the six COVID-19 cases in schools are located, said a good working relationship between the GSCS and the SHA is key.

"According to school administration, it sounds like things went really smoothly[at Holy Cross]," said Kunz. "They said that the health authority staff were wonderful to work with."