Province's active cases approach 6,000

Another 678 new COVID-19 cases were reported in Alberta on Wednesday, the highest single-day increase in nearly three months.

May 20 was the last day higher numbers were reported, with 812 new cases discovered the day previous.

At 5,993 on Wednesday, Alberta's active cases have neared the 6,000 mark just two days after surpassing 5,000. This is also more than nine times higher than active cases were a month ago. More than 80 per cent of active cases are variant cases, and nearly all of these are of the Delta variant.

Provincial data shows 184 patients are hospitalized with COVID-19 including 48 in intensive care. Two more people have died — seven over the last week — for a total of 2,338 province-wide.

FOURTH WAVE PREDICTED

B.C. researchers have predicted Alberta will see a large fourth wave of COVID-19, primarily driven by unvaccinated people, and owing to the contagious Delta variant. Assuming the same level of restrictions currently in place continue, they predict more than 4,000 new cases a day by Sept. 15, nearly double that of the third wave.

Alberta's current COVID-19 situation appears similar to that heading into previous waves of the pandemic, though the rate of deaths has slowed as vaccinations have risen.

Overall hospitalizations are lower than the beginning of the third wave but ICU use is similar. On March 18 there were 696 new cases, 5,429 active cases, and 276 people in hospital including 48 in ICU.

Heading into the second wave on Oct. 29, there were 622 new and 5,172 active cases, 140 in hospital and 25 in intensive care.

Hospitalizations and deaths are considered lagging indicators as it takes several weeks before cases rise to when these, too, increase.

Alberta data shows new cases are predominantly being found in people who are not vaccinated, and those who don't have both doses of a COVID -19 vaccine are very much more likely to be hospitalized than those who are not.

According to the province's publicly available data, since the beginning of this year 93.8 per cent of COVID -19 cases were found in unvaccinated people, or in those who were diagnosed with the disease within two weeks of their first dose, before that vaccine was fully in effect.

In the same time frame, 91.7 per cent of people hospitalized with COVID-19 were not vaccinated or they were diagnosed before two weeks had passed from their immunization.

By Wednesday, 77 per cent of Albertans 12 and up had one COVID-19 vaccine while 68.2 per cent have had two doses.