Second Fairhaven care home resident dies
A second resident of the Fairhaven long-term-care home in Peterborough who had tested positive for COVID-19 died on Wednesday night, authorities announced Thursday.
Five other Fairhaven residents have now tested positive for COVID-19 in the area’s only current outbreak. All were from the Westview 2 area of the municipally owned Dutton Road facility in the north end of Peterborough.
The five patients who tested positive are in an isolation unit set up in the facility’s Great Room, Fairhaven executive director Lionel Towns told reporters Thursday during Peterborough Public Health’s weekly teleconference briefing on the pandemic.
Another isolation unit could be set up if the numbers of positive cases exceed the Great Room’s capacity, he said.
All residents on Westview 2 have also been placed in isolation, Towns said, while staff have been cohorted into small groups to limit possible exposure.
Towns said the residents are scared and wishing they could interact with one another and see their families in person.
He said he hopes there will be no more cases following the measures that have been taken to keep people who are positive or symptomatic isolated, but he realizes it can take time for symptoms to show for people who have been exposed.
Many residents on Westview 2 have now tested negative, Towns said.
“We’re doing everything we can right now to isolate people who are sick,” Towns said.
The Fairhaven outbreak is an indication of how difficult it is to contain the virus, he said.
“Everybody is a bit numb about it because we thought we had prepared extremely well,” Towns said.
It’s the fourth death in Peterborough city and county, Curve Lake First Nation and Hiawatha First Nation since the pandemic began and the second this week (the first Fairhaven death was a woman in her 90s, according to Public Health Ontario).
The number of confirmed cases in the jurisdiction has risen by 14 over the past week, medical officer of health Dr. Rosana Salvaterra said, and most have been through close contact with confirmed cases.
Two new confirmed cases were reported Thursday afternoon, bringing the cumulative total of confirmed cases since the pandemic began to 166. There are 12 active cases.
An outbreak was declared Oct. 31 at Fairhaven after a caregiver of a resident in the Westview 2 area tested positive. The caregiver is the eighth positive case related to the Fairhaven outbreak, Salvaterra said.
Towns said the caregiver was not a Fairhaven employee, but he cannot give more specific information about who the caregiver was to avoid identifying the person.
The virus was not necessarily transmitted into the home by the caregiver, Towns said, it
could have come from someone else.
“We don’t have a smoking gun here,” Salvaterra said.
The virus was acquired through close contact, she said, and tracing has narrowed down the likely origin, but she did not specify where.
The 256-bed Fairhaven has cancelled general visits, essential caregiver visits and resident leaves until the outbreak is declared over. Staff are using electronic devices to facilitate virtual visits.
Palliative patients are allowed two visitors at a time, but they must wear personal protective equipment.
Enhanced house cleaning and extra disinfection for high touch surfaces is continuing, according to Fairhaven.
Salvaterra urged all longterm-care home staff and visi
tors in the area to follow all the public health guidelines to prevent the spread of the virus.
“Those vulnerable residents depend on us for their protection,” Salvaterra told reporters during the teleconference.
Peterborough remains in the green prevent zone under the province’s new colour-coded system that went into effect on Saturday.
Salvaterra said more measures may need to be taken locally to maintain the green rating.
She said the health unit is prepared to take more of an enforcement approach than an education approach to ensure that businesses and service providers follow all the guidelines.
Minimizing social contact and using physical distancing and masks just makes sense whether you are in a red or a green zone, she said.
The leading source of exposure to the virus is close contact with a confirmed case of CO
VID-19, Salvaterra said, adding that several newly reported cases this week were acquired through close contact with a known case.
She also said 32,350 local residents have been tested to date — 700 more than a week ago.
Peterborough’s second wave of COVID-19 is rising “slowly,” Salvaterra said.
“But with our current outbreak (at Fairhaven), I would expect to see it rise more rapidly in the next week.”
Mayor Diane Therrien was at the virtual press briefing, and she urged citizens to continue following public health guidelines.
“We need to keep practising physical distancing, wearing masks and caring about other people in order to slow the spread of the second wave,” she said.
Selwyn Mayor Andy Mitchell, who is the chair of the health board, said at the briefing that the rising second wave has
meant increased hospitalizations across Ontario.
“Peterborough is not immune to these trends,” he said. “We need to continue to have fun with each other, but when we do it, it needs to be done differently. Don’t party hearty — stay in small groups.”
Citizens must adhere to public health guidelines, he said, to keep healthy as Christmas approaches.
“We need to celebrate Christmas, this year more than ever, but when we do it, it will need to be done differently,” Mitchell said.
Celebrate only with immediate family in household, he said, and come up with “creative” ways to celebrate virtually with relatives and friends who live outside your household.
“It will let us stay green (under the rating system) and continue to enjoy the things that make life special.”