A portion of Central Newfoundland is now under Alert Level 3 due to government trying to control the spread of the Omicron variant. That means more restrictions for travellers coming into the province.
As of 3 p.m. Tuesday all fully vaccinated travellers entering the province will have to isolate for five days and take rapid tests on each of those days. If those come back negative, they can leave isolation.
Children 5 to 11 who are not fully vaccinated will follow the same rules as their parents, and follow modified self isolation after day five until the full 14 days have passed.
Post-secondary students must also abide by the new rules, in addition to getting a PCR test.
Rotational workers who are fully vaccinated must book a PCR test between days 0-3, take rapid tests for five days, and follow modified self isolation. If all tests are negative, they can leave isolation on day five.
The measures were announced during an unscheduled COVID briefing on Sunday, during which Chief Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Janice Fitzgerald was emotional about having to bring in such measures close to Christmas. With teary eyes, her voice cracked as she delivered her signature “hold fast” signoff.
The province’s Chief Medical Officer of Health is providing some clarity as to how they plan to use rapid testing kits moving forward.
A total of 61 new cases of COVID-19 were announced in the province over the course of the weekend. There are nine confirmed cases of Omicron, and 34 presumptive positive cases.
In other provinces, rapid testing kits are widely available to the general public, but not so here. Currently, the province is mostly giving them out to incoming travellers.
Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Janice Fitzgerald says they are looking at ways to use the tests more efficiently. However, she says that if simply doing rapid tests would stop case counts from rising, then a lot of jurisdictions in the country would be in different situations right now.
Fitzgerald says the tests must be used as judiciously as possible to get the best results, which may mean not everyone in the province using them.
For example, she says they have plans to use them in schools, especially for students who live long distances from testing centres. As well, they have plans to employ them during outbreaks to preserve PCR capacity.