The COVID-19 outbreak at the Chatham hospital has grown to a total of eight cases.
On Monday, the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA) reported three more cases in the Medicine Unit. There was a total of five cases listed on Friday. CKHA reported six COVID-19 patients remain in the Medicine Unit. Four patients are connected to the outbreak while two other COVID-19 patients receiving care in that unit are not related to the outbreak.
The Medicine Unit is still receiving COVID-19 patients during the outbreak. Hospital officials said three patients related to the outbreak have been discharged and a visitor to a positive patient is at home isolating. The outbreak was declared May 11, 2021 after two patients in the unit tested positive for the virus.
Emily Field with CKHA Communications said the latest positives come from mass testing and the hospital anticipates there could be more positive results with continued testing.
"We test all inpatients initially, so that is where our 'first round' of positive results come from. Then we test again on day 5 and day 10. At the same time, CK Public Health follows up with all discharged patients who had been on the unit during the affected period, they are tested in the community – so some positives are contributed from that testing as well," said Field. "From day 5 inpatient swabbing yesterday, one positive result was received. This patient had originally tested negative on the first round of swabbing."
As of Monday morning, the Chatham-Kent Public Health reported there were 10 local residents admitted to the CKHA’s Chatham site with COVID-19 — an increase of one from Friday. CKHA said it has a total of 11 COVID-19 patients. Ten are CK residents and one is not. Four of those patients are in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) and one is in the Progressive Care Unit. There are also two patients on ventilators in the ICU, one of them is a COVID-19 patient while the other is not.
Hospital officials said the ICU is 80 per cent full while the Medicine, Surgical, Critical Care Unit is at 80.7 per cent occupancy.
Public health officials added Monday that the outbreak at an undisclosed workplace is over. The report showed 10 new cases and 14 resolved cases Monday for a total number of 32 active cases in Chatham-Kent.
