One confirmed COVID case in Okanagan seniors complex

Special to The Herald

One case of COVID-19 has been confirmed at a Kelowna seniors complex, provincial officials announced Thursday.

A female employee of the Hawthorn Park-Orchard Manor buildings on KLO Road has tested positive for the disease, provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said.

It’s the first case of COVID-19 at a long-term care facility in the Okanagan.

“There’s a single case at the moment and outbreak protocols have been implemented at that facility,” Henry said during the daily update on the spread of COVID-19 around B.C.

“As far as right now there’s no residents that are affected, but we need to ensure that they are monitored for the coming 14 days to be sure,” Henry said.

As with all long-term care homes, a variety of COVID-19 precautions were in place at Hawthorn Park-Orchard Manor before the employee tested positive for the disease, Henry said.

Those measures included enhanced cleaning, a ban on visitors and a requirement for staff to wear masks. “All of those things were in place,” Henry said.

Interior Health staff is working with the home’s operator, Verve Senior Living, to implement infection control protocols at Hawthorn Park-Orchard Manor, she said.

“They have a team that goes in to make sure that everything’s put in place and that people are retrained to make sure that they know how to use their personal protective equipment appropriately,” she said.

“And there’s screening of staff on a regular basis for symptoms and also for residents, at least daily, of symptoms,” she said. “Hopefully, we won’t see any transmission in that facility, but at the moment it’s hard to know.”

The staff member who tested positive for COVID-19 is in selfisolation at home.

There are a total of 161 beds at the complex. Hawthorn Park has independent and supportive living suites, while Orchard Manor provides long-term care. The two sites are connected by a common building.

A total of 347 residents and staff at long-term care facilities around B.C. have tested positive for COVID-19. The vast majority of the outbreaks have been in the Vancouver area.

Across B.C., 29 new cases were confirmed Thursday, bringing the total to 1,824.

As well as the new case at the Kelowna seniors residence, there were two other confirmed COVID19 cases in the region served by Interior Health, bringing the total to 156.

As of Thursday, there was no mention on the Hawthorn Park website of the single case of COVID-19 at the retirement complex. But John Carnella, president of Verve, posted a message on April 7 saying significant precautions to try to prevent the spread of the disease had been undertaken.

“Our residents have been asked to shelter in place and both our employees and our residents are now subject to twice daily temperature checks and symptom screening,” Carnella wrote. “So far, the protocols are working. We are keeping people safe and doing our best to create some level of normalcy in what is clearly an unprecedented situation.”

Outbreaks of COVID-19 have been declared over at 10 longterm care facilities around B.C., with no reports of new cases for the preceding two weeks.

Four more British Columbians have died of the disease, for a total of 94 around B.C. Most of those who’ve died have been residents of care homes.

There has been one death, that of a man in his late 60s, in the Interior Health region.

So far, Henry said, B.C. has not experienced the kind of explosive growth in COVID-19 infections seen in many other parts of the world.

“We have been fortunate in many ways in British Columbia in that we have not had a dramatic increase, that accelerated upswing that we saw in many other places,” Henry said. “And much of that is due to the way British Columbians have responded together, to keep their distance, and to do the things we need to try and do to manage this in our community.”

A total of 103 British Columbians are currently being treated for COVID-19 in hospital, down from a peak of 149 in early April. Ten people are being treated for the disease at hospitals in Interior Health.

While hospitalizations are down and the pace of new COVID19 has decelerated, Health Minister Adrian Dix urged continued vigilance in the form of physical distancing and cautioned that a too-soon opening of the economy could yet cause the disease to spread rapidly.

“Easing up on our efforts too soon makes it too easy for COVID19,” Dix said. “Too easy for it to spread, too easy for it to claim more of our seniors and elders, and too easy for it to undo all of the sacrifice we’ve made together.

“We need to renew B.C. without re-booting the virus,” Dix said. “A relative flattening of the curve is a recognition of what everybody watching us today, and what everybody in B.C. has done, but we have to keep going.”