OTTAWA -
In lieu of an in-person update to the media, Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada's Chief Public Health Officer, issued the following statement today:
"There have been 113,556 cases of COVID-19 in Canada, including 8,885 deaths. 87% of people have now recovered. Labs across Canada have tested over 3,761,927people for COVID-19 to date. Over the past week, an average of 44,000 people were tested daily, with 1% testing positive and an average of over 485 cases being reported daily from across the country.
Living with COVID-19 means striking a balance between resuming activities while keeping the rate of transmission low.
In the absence of a vaccine, living with COVID-19 is not without risk. As our economy and society opens up, we will continue to see cases and clusters of COVID-19. That is why we need to proceed slowly and carefully as we live through the next phases of this pandemic.
Recent national surveillance data show that young adults aged 20-39 years of age account for the highest incidence rates across all ages in Canada. For the most recent reporting week (July 15-22,2020), incidence rates were highest for males and females in the 20-29 year age group, at 14.4 and 13.8 cases per 100,000 population, respectively. This is followed by incidence rates of 9.4 and 7.0 cases per 100,000 population in males and females in the 30-39 year age group.
Moreover, people in any age groups, not just elderly adults, can face serious health consequences due to the complications of COVID-19. Younger Canadians are not invincible to severe illness. Sixty-three percent of COVID-19 cases reported to the Public Health Agency of Canada this past week were young people under the age of 39 years and one third (31%) of these were hospitalized for their illness.
