Sask.'s first weekly COVID-19 update shows record-tying 384 patients in hospital

The first weekly report of COVID-19 data from the Saskatchewan government shows 384 hospitalizations as of Wednesday, matching the previous record from Feb. 3.

The Saskatchewan government stopped providing daily updates publicly this week and will now release them weekly on Thursdays.

Most of the data the government provided in Thursday's summary covers the period from Jan. 30 to Feb. 5. Deaths related to COVID since Feb. 5 have not been included.

The exception is hospitalizations, which were provided up to Wednesday, Feb. 9, when there were 384 people in hospital with COVID-19:

• 160 were admitted for COVID.
• 206 have been determined as incidental, meaning they came in for something else and were then diagnosed with COVID.
• 18 are undetermined.

On Sunday, the last day the province provided daily numbers, 332 hospitalizations were reported, meaning hospitalizations increased by 52 in four days. On Feb. 2, there were 383 patients in hospital, which is an increase of one week over week.

Test positivity in the province from Jan. 30 to Feb. 5 was 31.1 per cent on 17,115 PCR tests. A total of 22 deaths were recorded over those seven days.

For the first time since its arrival in the province, the Omicron variant accounted for 100 per cent of sequenced variants.

Nearly 86 per cent of people 18 and older have two doses of vaccine. Regina has 81 per cent of people five and older having received two doses. It is the only region above 80 per cent in that category.

The province is just shy of 50 per cent for third doses at 49.5 per cent.

The government also shared the most common pre-existing conditions for severe COVID-19 cases for the first time publicly.

Since the start of the pandemic, 16,429 people with COVID-19 in the province reported having one or more underlying conditions.

Of 2,349 severe cases, hypertension was the most common condition at 51 per cent, followed by diabetes (45 per cent), cardiac disease (35 per cent), lung disease (27 per cent), obesity (eight per cent) and pregnancy (two per cent).

Sask. may only report weekly data to federal health agency

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Health said the province is also looking to move from daily reporting of COVID-19 data to the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) to weekly reporting.

"We are in discussions with PHAC regarding shifting to a weekly submission schedule to align with our new reporting cycle."

The ministry said the information sharing agreement does not specify the frequency at which reporting should be shared.