 briefing by pausing to acknowledge the preliminary findings at the former St. Joseph's Mission Residential School near Williams Lake. We acknowledge that news of these findings brings back many painful memories back to the surface for residential school survivors and their families and indeed for entire communities. Services are available for survivors needing support as they grieve and navigate this tragedy. For Indian Residential School Survivors Society phone 1-800-721-0066. For the Sotan Lalum Society phone 1-888-403-3123. These numbers and more information about support services will be provided as a backgrounder to our statement today and of course will be available broadly. I want to recognize the strength, leadership and courage shown by the Williams Lake First Nations and the communities of survivors and their families as they undertake the difficult but necessary work of telling the truth about our harmful history and legacy of the residential school system in British Columbia. And with that it's my honor to introduce Dr. Bonnie Henry. Dr. Bonnie Henry. Thank you very much and good afternoon. I also would like to extend my thoughts to the Williams Lake First Nation and all of the families and communities. Another 93 possible children who did not return home and my heart goes out to those families, those communities who have been living with this unbearable loss. And my hope is that this is a first step not only in acknowledging and grieving but bringing those children home. So today we'll I'll be talking a little bit about the our latest update on the COVID-19 public health response. Some of the changes that are coming in will be posted in the coming days and recognizing as well that we will be very soon at our two year anniversary from the very first case that we had here in British Columbia in our first breast briefing on Friday. We do continue to see a gradual decline in our case rates over time and a leveling off of the test positivity. And as you know, the numbers of daily cases gives us a sense of trends using that one piece of surveillance data. But we also have the other surveillance data that also supports that we are on that downward trend in community infections. But at the same time, the number of people in hospital remains high. And it's the highest it has been in our pandemic and it's putting significant strain on our health care system. As our pandemic evolves and Omicron brings these new challenges, we have evolved our pandemic response and I've talked quite a bit about that in the last two weeks. Last week, we made many changes that I had indicated in briefings before, but it challenges us when these things are different and new. As we shared last week and thinking at the heat map that we presented on Friday, we do know that even now with Omicron, some people are at much greater risks of hospitalization and severe illness. And we need to bear that in mind as we make these changes. The risk factors are clear. Number one and most important and one of the reasons why we are getting through this wave and the way that we are is vaccination status. We know that vaccines make a difference, a tremendous difference. The other one, of course, is age. And from the very beginning, we've seen that the older we are, the higher likelihood we have of having more severe illness and the higher likelihood we have of having other underlying conditions that may complicate an infection with something like COVID. And in particular, people who have compromised immune systems, what we've talked about is clinically extremely vulnerable. They are more at risk even with vaccination. We also know that with each vaccine that we receive, our risk of hospitalization goes down dramatically. Yes, we know that people who have been fully vaccinated have been infected with the virus, with Omicron in particular. And some may question that the effectiveness of vaccines overall. I want to assure you and we see these data coming more and more now. It takes time to put these pieces of the puzzle together when something new and a new strain of the virus comes on the scene. We now have had another month of time since Omicron came on the scene and we are seeing more and more pieces of this puzzle come together. And it shows us the effectiveness of vaccines and the importance of vaccines and protecting people from severe illness. And also now, of course, there's more and more data that shows that the booster doses also protect against infection even with Omicron. We do, however, need to continue the number of measures that we have in place in the community and those also have been working to try and mitigate those risks even when there is a risk of milder disease. So with that in mind, we will be extending the BC vaccine card program through to June 30th and it will continue to apply to people over the age of 12. If we are in a better place in June 30th, however, we will look to make adjustments early. The BC vaccine card program is specifically designed to address those and mitigate those risks that allow us to keep certain businesses and activities open during the period of the pandemic. As we move through this period, it will, I expect, no longer be necessary. But right now it is one of those important tools that we have. As mentioned has been the case all along with a sudden surge, it takes time to gather and reassess and assess the data. In recent days there have been a number of publications, three studies from the U.S. We have looked at additional information from Ontario, from Japan, from South Korea and it really tells us right now that those booster doses give good strong protection for the virus. It boosts up that protection for severe disease and hospitalization but it also decreases your risk of contracting the virus probably by about 50 to 60%. So it is not 100%. It is not as high as we saw with all of the other strains that we have seen and particularly that really important protection against the severeness of delta. But it is important and it does stop your risk of transmitting and contracting it yourselves. We do know, however, that I do want to also mention that people in the clinically extremely vulnerable groups, one in two, the people with compromised immune systems and we know that we have had a third dose to get them up to that level that most of us gets with two doses and we did announce when we announced our booster program and I just want to reassure people in that category that yes, you will receive your invites for your booster dose at six months and we know that people who have immune compromising conditions and the data from Friday shows us this again. That the risk remains high and you do need to take extra precautions and all the rest of us need to be aware of that and take those extra precautions and we need to be aware of the public health orders so that we reduce the risk to everyone because we all have someone in our circle, whether it is family, whether it is in our social contacts at work, who is immune compromised, who is older, who may have that extra risk right now when there is so much of this virus still circulating. Whether we know it or not, we need to take those actions. We still have provincial health officer orders in effect. We still have things like our BC vaccine card for those highest risk activities and we need to all take those actions that work. Our number one tool, not the only tool but our number one tool remains immunization, vaccination with both dose one, dose two and your booster dose but it also is things that we are gathering with right now when there is so much virus in our community. Wearing masks, good quality masks when we are indoor, public settings around other people, washing our hands regularly, staying away from others when we are sick, particularly if we have a fever and following those important things like our COVID safety plans that we have in our workplaces, like the plans that we have in our workplaces. This remains so, so important right now as we weather this wave of our storm. Today the national advisory committee on immunization updated their guidance around childhood vaccines, particularly for those 5 to 11. And you may recall when they first came up that the language was around may be offered. Well, they have strengthened that is because we still what we are seeing is that 5 to 11 year olds thankfully remain at low risk of severe disease but the number of children being hospitalized because of infections has gone up as the number of infections has gone up across our communities. In addition, we have new and reassuring real world safety data from millions and millions of young children vaccinated. And so they have strengthened the recommendation from to say that all children 5 to 11 should be vaccinated. We also want to this guidance also recommends that there is continues to be at least 8 weeks between first dose and second dose. That first dose will provide tremendous protection. It's that 80% protection once you've had your system started developing those antibodies and that will make the difference for what's happening right now. But we want to make sure that we're protecting children for the long run as well. And we know that that extended interval between doses gives our immune system a chance to respond and give extra strength to our cell mediated immunity and boost up our antibodies as well. And we want to make sure that we're giving the best priming of the immune system for the future, too, as we get through this wave. I do want to assure parents who have already had their children vaccinated with their first dose that you will receive an invitation to book your second dose around the eight week period. And sometimes it's a few days before or a few days after the gradual decline in cases in our community, combined with the increase in vaccination in children of all ages, I will be making some changes to the restrictions on youth sports tournaments. Starting February 1st next week, youth sports tournaments can once again resume. I know that this is an important time of the year for many different sports and especially team sports and we've been working with many different teams to be done in a safe way. So that means tournament organizers, you can start planning in anticipation of this change for next week. Right now, because of what we're seeing, adult tournaments remain paused for now. Today, this week, we saw many of our post-secondary institutions going back into on-campus learning again and I'm just really pleased and happy to be part of our institutions who started even before now. This really is so important and we recognize that and I just know that we've been working hard, working with all of faculty and staff and student organizations for all of our post-secondary institutions and we know that young people have been so differentially negatively affected by this pandemic and that these on the growth for their development for the research and all of the bright minds that we need to stimulate in our universities and colleges and I think this is really possible because young people have stepped up and gotten vaccinated and the high vaccination rates we have in post-secondary institutions make it safe and we've updated conversations and collaboration with the institutions and the Ministry of Advanced Ed the safe return to campus guidelines and that includes the program for accessing rapid tests and having those to support safe back-to-campus activities so I think that's going to be a great step forward for many, many students, faculty and staff across the province. Additionally we've been working with the early childhood sector and early childhood educators who have been in childcare operators who have been working so hard through this pandemic and I know these changes have led to lots of questions and concerns. We have last week posted the updated guidelines for the early childhood educators in childcare sector and we've been taking lots of questions over the last few days and working with them to answer these questions and address with some questions and answers for people and I know we have a town hall tomorrow night to walk through it with many of the providers and I just want to again express my appreciation for all of the early childhood educators and our childcare programs for the stellar job that they're doing caring for our children during a very changing and challenging time. In step with the changes that we saw last week, our care and assisted living facilities have seen a sharp increase in cases and our seniors and elders continue to bear the significant burden from this virus and that has not changed in terms of people becoming ill. However, the high rate of immunization and the high rate of booster doses that we're seeing amongst our seniors in long-term care and amongst staff means that the lower rate of severe illness in long-term care homes and assisted living homes and thankfully a much, much reduced risk of things like death. Because of this, combined with the severe impacts that come with the measures that we have had to take to try and suppress transmission in long-term care homes, we are working very closely with long-term care homes to make sure that we can continue to help every resident who has one and make sure that we have those all-important visits continuing even when we have some cases of COVID-19 and public health teams are actively monitoring, engaged with facilities across the province to manage these outbreaks and balance that risk that we have and the harms that come both from Omicron and from the measures that we put in place. The guidance for outbreaks, we are working on that now and that will be posted again in the coming days, balancing that need for restrictions with the severity of illness that we see on a case-by-case basis. So I have spoken last week in some detail about the fact that with Omicron it has changed some of the tools that we have used quite extensively over the past two years, in particular with that shorter time interval, the generation time, so the time between one person getting infected and being exposed and the next person getting sick and passing it on to others is much shorter with this new virus strain. So it is no longer viable for us to be able to rely on the contact tracing that we were doing that was really making a difference. And it's really that recognition that tested you have likely unknowingly passed it on to others. Previously with different strains when that was five or six days before the next generation, we had time. We had time on our side and the opportunity to find people and to help them isolate before they would pass it on to others. That is far more difficult now and why it is important for us to all go back to what we need to do as we are navigating our way through our days and deciding what it is safe for us to do individually for us and our children every day. We need to continue, as I've said, following those public health orders because they address some of the highest risk settings that we're faced with right now and those restrictions that are in place. But we also need to take into account, not only about our loved ones and ourselves, but those around us who we may or may not know are at higher risk, perhaps an older relative, a colleague that we work with or a close friend that we spend time with. Let's remember that they're sharing their risk with us and we share our risk with them. That's why those layers of protection continue to be so important. So in addition to focusing on where we need to make a difference in high risk settings, particularly long-term care, supporting post-secondary institutions, supporting schools, supporting some of those high risk accommodation settings, it means doing what we all have a role to do, doing what we have been doing. As I mentioned, getting vaccinated, wearing masks, washing your hands, keeping yourself cautious if you are at high risk, it means paying attention every day to how we are feeling, staying home if we're feeling unwell, particularly if we have a fever, staying away from others and returning to normal activities when we feel better. We also need to be aware that we have in our workplaces COVID-19 safety plans. That's one of those things that helps us mitigate that risk for people or may be infected asymptomatically. If we use the BC CDC symptom checker, which has now been updated, to help identify if you likely have COVID-19 and then follow the guidance on when you need to get tested. We do know that it is important to test certain people, particularly people where you might be eligible for treatment or you may be more at risk of severe illness or for people like healthcare workers to understand when it's safe to go back to work. If you are confirmed positive, then you must follow the self-isolation requirements. If you're unvaccinated, that means 10 days for adults. If you're vaccinated or if your child under the age of 18, that's five days. And we know that because we know that children have milder illness and we tend to have less virus and shed less virus . But it's important that we consider that risk doesn't drop off to zero after five days. But it does decrease quite dramatically after about five days in most people. So we need to, if you have mild illness and you're feeling well and your fever is resolved after five days, then you can go back to activities. But it's not back to everything all at once. We still need to realize that we may be shedding COVID safety plans at work wearing a mask when we're around other people in indoor settings and avoiding high risk settings like long-term care homes if we can during that next additional five days. So those are the things that we can all do that will get us through what we're dealing with right now with Omicron in the next few weeks. This has been a tough go for all of us and we've been changing. We've gone through many different iterations of how this virus has affected us over this last two years. And we're all tired of COVID-19. One more than me. And the impacts that the virus has had on all factors in our life. I think we would all love to be done with COVID. But as much as we would like that, our reality is that COVID has passed right now. And we're not yet over it. So let's offer each other that encouraging words, that warm smile, that connection, that kindness. Remember that this is ever changing and that creates a lot of anxiety for many people. We have more distance to go but we will see our way through this phase of our storm as well. Friday is, as I mentioned, the anniversary of the first case in our first briefing. And as I said this past Friday, Omicron has changed and forced us to respond differently. And this is a transition. But I do believe we will have a gentler summer that we will get to a place where we no longer need many of the measures and restrictions we have in place right now. We will also need to continue to support our health care that is being felt the most and prepare us for our living with COVID in the future in a different way in a way that doesn't have that dramatic effects on our lives. So I want to sum up today by saying thank you. Thank you, everybody, for being patient with each other, for getting through this, for doing the things that we need to do and being kind and being calm and being safe. Thank you. Thank you very much, Dr Henry. Today I will be providing an update on rapid test inventory and distribution as well as the impact of COVID-19, the Omicron variant of concern on health care workers in our health care system and surgical postponements. First I want to touch briefly on our immunization efforts which have been extraordinary more than 350,000 doses administered in the last week 110,000 of those in pharmacies. Vaccinations for children aged 5 to 11 continue as Dr Henry has spoke. There is lots of available capacity more than 175,000 175,968 children have now had their dose 1 immunization against COVID-19. That number can be higher. We encourage everybody to register today at the get vaccinated website at 1-833-838-2323 if you want to call in. I would also note that invitations for dose 2 for 5 to 11 began as of yesterday with around 2,000 invitations already sent out. More than 27,500 dose 2 invitations for children 5 to 11 are being sent out this week based on an 8-week interval. The booster campaign as well continues full steam ahead. In fact, not just 350,000 doses but 350,000 boosters in the last week we project similar numbers this week. I want to say this, there are 644,000 people who have been invited for their booster in BC and have not yet booked an appointment. We strongly encourage them to book into our clinics or pharmacies. There is lots of capacity and I want to say a special note. There has been an extraordinary take up of immunization and if you saw Dr. Henry's presentation on Friday, you know the risk to those over the age of 70 from COVID-19 continues to be high. There are 48,070 plus individuals who have received their invite that have not yet booked a booster. It is urgent for them to get vaccinated as they are much more likely to be immunized if they acquire COVID-19 and we encourage them to do that as well as encourage everybody who has not received their dose one and dose two immunizations to get them today. With respect to rapid tests to date BC has received 6,931,175 rapid tests and deployed 4,130,656 of these tests to key strategic areas. This leaves an inventory of 2,800,000 tests 972,355 of which were received over the last four days. About 558,000 of the current inventory are not suitable for deployment for take away or personal use. That leaves us 2,242,000 tests in our current inventory that are suitable for self-administered use and we know that 319,860 tests are in transit and expected to arrive in BC in the days ahead. This week, subject to timely delivery from the federal government we will be working to deliver over 2,500,000 test kits as follows 351,000 for repackaging and distribution to COVID test sites across BC to replenish their supply 603,750 to replenish supplies at acute care centers for symptomatic health care workers and health authority programs for example emergency departments 3,000 to long-term care to replenish and continue to support symptomatic staff and to test visitors 50,000 to assisted living to support symptomatic staff and to test visitors 258,750 to support rural, remote and indigenous communities 300,000 more test kits to support K-12 education 311,000 to support businesses and organizations as part of the point of care screening program as more tests arrive we will continue to push the areas in greatest need and expand access across post-secondary and other areas as identified in the plan we presented on December 21, 2021 Earlier today the BCCDC announced it will be distributing rapid test kits to post-secondary institutions for employees and students with COVID-19 symptoms we are also allocating over 250,000 rapid tests for the childcare sector with the Ministry of Children and Family Development to consider best use and delivery of tests to licensed childcare operators across BC for testing of symptomatic staff and to support continuity of their operations we will have more to say about this as our supply from Canada is clarified in the week ahead the expected deliveries from our federal partners have changed somewhat since last week currently BC expects to receive 10,868,720 tests between today and February 25 in the middle of February this is a reduction from the 15,719,000 that we were expecting as of last Friday with that said 10 million is a lot of tests and we are very appreciative to receive them clearly the supply of tests will be substantial but there is continuing to be flux in orders and deliveries as they get firmed up by the federal government it is also worth noting that we have delivered over 370,000 rapid tests to long-term care facilities across BC since last December since late December I should say these facilities have a direct line to their health authority if more tests are needed and we are replenishing supply to long-term care facilities as tests arrive in BC in fact 210,000 more tests are going to long-term care facilities this week once delivered that is over 580,000 tests provided directly to long-term care facilities since late December and these tests are in addition to tests available if they choose to use rapid tests to help manage cases, clusters or outbreaks I would like to take the opportunity to provide an update on the impact of sickness on health care workers in our health care system first to acknowledge the exceptional work under very difficult circumstances of all of our health care workers in every community across BC in serving British Columbians in a challenging time health authorities have been closely monitoring sickness levels across health services especially in hospitals, long-term care and home support I can report that from September January 17th and 23rd at least 17,954 workers called in sick almost precisely a similar number as to last week this includes 4,252 in Fraser Health 3,265 in Interior Health 1,589 in Northern Health 1,840 in the Provincial Health Services Authority BC Emergency Health Services 2,836 in Vancouver Coastal 3,359 in Island Health and 813 in Providence Health Care this is the number of health care workers affected and does not reflect the number of days or shifts they may have called in sick illness could it be due to COVID-19 or something else the number of health care workers is relatively unchanged from last week and down from the week of January 3rd to 9th and finally now our weekly surgical renewal update Health authorities reported reported in the period January 16th to January 22nd that they had postponed 790 non-urgent schedule surgeries that 71 in Fraser Health 17 in Vancouver Coastal Health 401 in Interior Health 275 in Island Health and 26 in the Provincial Health Services Authority no surgeries were postponed in the Northern Health Authority cumulatively from September 5th 2021 to today to January 22nd I should say regional surges of COVID and factors including severe weather patterns have caused 5,895 for surgical postponements as noted and we've seen this it's compared to the postponements in the first wave in April and in May of 2020 at that time there were significantly more surgeries postponed we are of course wanting to postpone as few surgeries as possible at that time we dropped down I think one week under 3,000 surgeries which is a very low number when you consider that we do a base of about 7,000 a week we continue to do a significant number of surgeries of all kinds across BC but it is a significant challenge and the reason why we announced this is that we are aging these plans is to support our health care system and make sure that it's there for everybody when they need it most urgently every day now I would say more and more British Columbians are getting vaccinated and whether it's our first dose our second, our third or our booster it is an essential commitment we make to stopping the rapid spread of COVID-19 that critical action we take that makes the vital difference our efforts all of our efforts together slow the rapid spread we've proven this all of our efforts together result in surgeries being rebooked we've proven this again and again our efforts and all of our efforts will get us through we know this as Dr Henry has said on Friday at our briefing on Friday will be two years since the first briefing since the first case in the first briefing that was held in Vancouver has been a long and difficult time for everybody I would agree with absolutely everyone who wishes it were over and over soon but these are the steps we can do now all of us together are a way to control our situation follow public health orders and guidance get vaccinated and support one another and continue to support our health care system in difficult times and with that we're happy to take your questions if you want to enter the queue you'll be limited to one question and one follow up our first question today goes to Richard Zussman Global News Dr Henry a lot of the restrictions that have been put in place are based on the science applied to Delta and I know things have evolved with Omicron but one of the outstanding ones has been an impact on events like weddings the industry is frustrated with this I'm just wondering what in the science shows you that a hockey game at Rogers arena with 9000 people and people cheering and in large cases people without masks on how is that a safer environment than someone hosting a wedding event hosting a wedding event you know these are there's always this how come it's safer to go to Walmart when there's a bunch of people there and how come it's risk setting what you're doing in that setting and I presented that a couple of weeks ago you know the whole variety of things that we look at when we were talking about gyms for example so we do know that no matter what it's those group settings when we're coming together when we are with people that we care about weddings are a perfect example and I just want to clarify weddings and funeral services are not restricted it is the celebrations the parties afterwards and we know that unvariably those are the settings that we are seeing transmission not at every single one clearly but at many many many and that was what it's very challenging and we've all been to wonderful weddings where yes you all start off with the right intentions and we're sitting at tables but you're with people you haven't seen it's a positive joyful time and so at the end of the evening you know it it becomes more of a celebration which is a wonderful thing but also very risky right now so yes there are measures that we have in place that address in a sort of sequential way the highest risk settings and then we put in mitigation things in lower risk settings and so we look at a hockey arena it's a much larger space there's lots of ventilation there's small numbers of people that are allowed in with the capacity limits the vaccine card and yes we do know that some people but when you're at a seat with very small number of people around you and a large amount of space it's much less risky than when you're in a night club or an indoor venue where you're closely with people without a mask on so it is a gradation of risk and we all know that there's some settings that we are seeing a lot of transmission some are the very same thing where we don't see any at all so it is based on risk that has not changed the factors that we're seeing have not changed it's indoor spaces with poorer ventilation less space where people are not as likely to wear their mask consistently those are places where we see transmission and as we have more and more transmissible strains of the virus become less and less able to there are more and more risky depending on the setting Richard do you have a follow up we are seeing situations where pharmacies and other places are selling rapid tests and as you are aware there is a high demand for these tests and in some cases the price of those tests have escalated quite quickly just one anecdotal piece of evidence that was brought forward to us was a place selling 5 tests for $100 a week later it was 5 tests for $150 what do you think about this sort of price gouging for accessing rapid tests and also to the announcement you made today extending the vaccine card can you explain to us the science behind extending it all the way until the end of June so I can't talk about pricing of rapid tests on the private market I will tell you that there is a global shortage of rapid tests we look to our neighbours to the south where they have been trying to get large numbers it affects the amounts we have been getting from Canada so I expect that has something to do with it as well we will and will continue to make rapid tests available in those settings where they are most useful first and if and when we get to that place where there is an unlimited supply we are my aim is to make sure that everybody has access to them as much as possible in terms of the vaccine card it has been very effective again it does not eliminate the risk but we do know and we continue to see that if you are not vaccinated your personal risk has gone up dramatically with the amount of virus that is circulating but also your risk of passing it on to others has gone up so we still see that if people who are fully vaccinated that mitigates that risk of both getting infected yourself and passing it on to others and doing that symptom screen making sure we are not feeling well that we are vaccinated that we have all of those other measures in place it is one tool that allows us to have air on the side of having people in watching the hockey game in restaurants and it does not eliminate the risk but it absolutely has been mitigating the risk and I know it has been used quite effectively by many people in many settings and what I said is we are expanding the program when we put it in place in August we were looking at the way that we were dealing with at the time and Omicron of course has meant that it has extended and changed once again I have said until the end of June but as I have also said we will be reevaluating as we go through this next few weeks and hopefully we will see a decrease in hospitalizations we will see a decrease in the circulation of this virus in our communities and we will be reassessing on a regular basis the need for all of the measures that we have in place Minister I do not know if you want to add to that say I think Richard as you know from January 25 to the middle of February we expect to receive 10,800,000 rapid tests and they will be distributed in the way that we laid out on December 21 we will write the details as they come and we will be providing details to you as to how they are being provided around BC why are we giving priority to long term care and to acute care and to schools and to certain businesses and lots of congregate settings and so on, why are we giving priority because even though 10,800,000 is a lot of rapid tests it is in fact about 2 per British Columbian and we have to focus on those areas where they can most effectively use and that is what we are planning to do and that is what we will continue to do and we will continue to provide detail briefings as to how those are taking place obviously no one wants to see anybody gouged and that is something to look at it is outside of the healthcare system it is something we will obviously be looking at but this is the supply we are getting and it is significant and we have to use it most effectively I think people would expect us to do and that is why we have laid out a detailed plan to do that and we are following that plan assiduously Next question Now that you are extending the vaccine passport I know you have been asked this in the past but do you have any plans to include the third booster dose to be fully vaccinated in the next 6 months assuming that you keep the passport in place until the end of June I consider the vaccine passport is the federal card program but the BC vaccine card that is in place for the limited number of venues here I do not expect to add a booster dose as being part of it for a number of reasons one is not everybody has yet eligible or has the opportunity to receive their booster dose and there is still a large proportion of people although that is getting less and less by the day who have not received their booster dose and have not yet been eligible for it so it would not make sense to make it a requirement when a proportion of people are not able to get it yet and it is much more important for us to make sure that we do not have this wave I have confidence in that but we do not know what is coming next so we want to make sure we are giving the best, strongest protection that we can for the future and I am hopeful that we will be in a different place before June and that will help us understand what is needed in terms of the BC vaccine card but again we will be reevaluating this on an ongoing basis why philosophy our philosophy and my team in coming up with the measures that we believe need to be in places about the least restrictive means the least we need to do to make sure we are finding that balance of keeping things open as safely as possible and preventing our healthcare system from getting strained even more than it is right now Rob, do you have a follow up? Sure, thanks Could you tell us a bit about safety risk differences between youth and adult sports tournaments that one is in the case of children being allowed to start operating again next week and the other stage closed why are they different and what is the different risk? Well it is a little bit to do with risk and it has a little bit to do with benefit so part of it is we know that adult tournaments at this time of the year tend to be a very important social event and that is of course a riskier situation and part of it is adults have the opportunities to do that on an ongoing basis and there have been provisions for example for some of the high impact sports and Olympic qualifying etc but we know that sports has a different place for youth in terms of growth and development and future opportunities so we have always prioritized making sure that young people can access that part of these important aspects in their lives particularly at that age and that there are timing limits for things like university scholarships that become important so we have taken all that into effect and prioritized really making sure that we can safely restart youth sports tournaments first Our next question goes to Graham Wood, Glacier Media Hi Dr. Gary Can you walk me through the initial reasons out to why you didn't include masks for kids K-3 and what your findings are being since then in terms of the effectiveness of masks for the three kids Yeah so our thinking about masks globally has evolved over time and the comfort level I think in all of us we have been doing masks and where we need to wear them and what type of masks and what things work better and partly it's talking with young people in my life and understanding that they can adapt and that they're fine with it so we have as you know updated our protocols in schools based on what we were seeing in those schools based on what we were seeing I think the other thing that's really important over time is that the virus has changed and I've said this before when you have more of it circulating and it's more infectious each layer becomes more important so as we were moving into more infectious strains and having those outbreaks it became more important to have that extra barrier in place for younger students as well you know there's no it's really challenging to tease apart is it the mask that made the difference or was it because we changed seating or because we changed cohorts so it's very difficult to understand what proportion of the risk was attributable to wearing masks or not wearing masks it really is an overall function of all of the different pieces that need to be in place is more infectious or we have more of it in the community having every single layer becomes more important so I know that's not exactly the answer that you want but those are some of the considerations that have gone into it I will say as well that we look very carefully at all of the data that we see around the world around benefits and harms of every measure and the one thing that is clear is that there are very little harms from mask wearing in those settings and children can adapt to it we've seen that very clearly Graham do you have a follow up yeah obviously there's a lot to this but in terms of the harm you're saying there's no harm I'm finding that it may not be studying us in terms of the social emotional and the hearing the audiology the ramifications of masking and how long do you think that this can continue for if these kids aren't going to be provided respirators per say you've got a whole bunch of things packed in there but obviously as I've said all along we want to do the least restrictive means the least possible so I think as we move through this wave it's really important that we take all of those protective measures we see this strain of the virus transmitting really rapidly between people I don't believe and I don't think there's anything that shows that in the community setting particularly for children that wearing a respirator so N95 that's not fit tested gives any additional protection in the settings that we're talking about where there are multiple things in place than a well-fitting comfortable mass that a child will wear so those are the things that we try and balance I hope and expect that as we get through this wave and I said I expect that we'll have a gentler summer having said that this virus is changing and it's spreading very rapidly in many countries around the world what the next strain is going to be like whether it'll be milder or more severe whether it'll be more or less transmissible able to evade the vaccine or previous infection so those are all unknowns but I do expect and from history that we'll see different patterns over time and that it should as we have more and more immunity that will protect us globally from having more severe strains emerge many times I believe in the future where mask wearing in indoor public places will be important again as a way of trying to reduce our risk of spreading it to others more so than contracting it ourselves and it'll be one of those things that we do during that winter respiratory season Next question Binder Sajan CTV Hi there I'm just wondering if there's an update on the field hospital whether some space has been acquired and given what we're seeing with cases and hospitalizations it's sort of unclear to me if any hospitals in the lower mainland seem to be on the brink and whether that field hospital would be required and even if there would be enough staff to staff it if needed That's over to you minister Next Binder we have 9,229 basic acute care beds we have 2,353 surge beds in our system for a total of 11,582 and currently in hospital our census in hospital as of end of day yesterday in any event was about 9,050 in other words under the 9,229 number now that doesn't mean things are easy in fact we frequently in pre-COVID times would run well above that number in the number we often talk about in January of 2020 we were at about 103.5% capacity about 9,500 beds at that time prior to COVID-19 the challenge now is as I've described there are a number of healthcare workers off sick and we have just under a thousand people hospitalized with COVID-19 in BC so we're making adjustments accordingly according both to the staff compliment we have and to our capacity compliment but what that tells you is it's not a field hospital in need we need to continue to support our staff should they get sick to be able to come back to get well and come back and to support those in our healthcare system so with that many beds surge beds in our existing hospital it's not the beds or the space for people that is the most significant thing so yes we have space for field hospital should be required but that is an unlikely possibility but we did that in April of 2020 and we've done that again recently to ensure that that's there if required but we are far from that that's not the issue in our healthcare system right now the issue as ever is people and being able to provide the services we need to get back as soon as possible to delivering the surgeries for all those who've had their surgeries postponed so that they can get on with their lives that is critical to us so I don't think the short answer is yes the field hospital is there but right now the challenge isn't additional beds in addition to the 11,500 plus beds that we have based on surge it's ensuring that we have enough staff there to take care of the people and yet as of yesterday that was about 175 under base bed capacity or 9,050 Binter do you have a follow up I do just wanted to ask about kids aged 5 to 11 in vaccination rates I've seen in some places like some provinces seem to have much higher rates how big an impact do you think this now see strengthening its recommendation will have on those vaccination rates or do you think there's just maybe people are just not quite sure if this is the right move for their child at this point and perhaps that will lag behind because as you say the risk isn't necessarily as high as it is for other age groups there's a couple of things that I looked with awe to Newfoundland and Avedore and my colleague Janice Cheryl there earlier today you know where they traditionally have very high rates of vaccination and kids there have been vaccinated in communities all around Newfoundland and Avedore so we could learn from how they do it and I think there's a combination of things I was a bit disappointed when Nassie first came out and the language wasn't that strong and the things that we learn about from Nassie their guidance is directed towards healthcare providers and there's nuance in there and sometimes that can lead people to think that it means it's not recommended which is not the case and I think they made that very clear in their statement today that they look at the situation that they were in when the decision was being made, how much we knew and you know the fact that at that time we weren't seeing in our communities clearly that has changed with Omicron and they make reference to that where we are now seeing that young people are being infected and yes the rate of serious illness in hospitalization is still very low in that age group thankfully but more and more numbers of children are ending up in hospital and we're seeing that here as well and we know that kids can get really sick with this and if they aren't hospitalized it can knock them out and it's not an innocuous illness as I've said so we don't want kids to get sick the other thing that vaccination and you know this is not what Nassie looks at they look at safety and effectiveness and how it should be used but the other important things that we all have is it allows kids to more easily and safely get back to all of those activities that are so important to the people in my life in that age group they also it's important for them to be part of protecting their grandparents and older people in their lives or making sure that they don't carry that anxiety of bringing it home to a parent who's going through treatments or is on medication so I think there's a whole variety of things that make it really important for us to offer this protection Nassie has come out and said that that it is an important thing particularly now with what we're seeing Next question we go to Derek Penner, Vancouver Sun Hi, yeah you've been reporting on deaths due to COVID since the beginning of the pandemic at this point how concerned are you that the deaths that you're reporting might not be capturing all the deaths that might be attributable to COVID-19 considering the statistics Canada data on excess deaths estimates Yeah, and we've also looked at excess deaths here in British Columbia and my team has been analyzing those data and I'll present some of that in the coming up soon but one of the things we did from the very beginning is we have a relationship with the Coroner Service so any suspected death in the community whether it's related to whether they have a test or not is investigated for COVID so we are confident that there's not a lot of people dying in the community from COVID that we don't know about and we've done that analysis a few times I will say that if anything we over call deaths from COVID and we're looking at the deaths that we had here in the month of January for example there were 119 with a date of death in January so I know there's been more deaths reported but many it sometimes takes time for example if somebody dies in the community and the Coroner does an investigation and the test comes back positive it may be several weeks before that is reported to us so we had 119 people with a date of death in January but not surprisingly about a third of them 41 of them were people associated with an outbreak in long-term care so in long-term care or acute care and in that situation we count anybody who dies within 30 days of their positive lab test in a long-term care outbreak so some people had very mild illness COVID probably had nothing to do with the reason they died or very little to do with the reason they died in some cases and in other cases it was directed because of COVID and if we look at people in the community the two thirds about 78 people who died in the month of January so far who weren't associated with a care home overwhelmingly it's about two thirds again are people over the age of 80 so again it goes back to what we were talking about last week the number one risk factors for severe illness and death we have had four people who are in their 50s or under including a person in their 30s and a person in their 40s who died in the month of January who did not as far as we know have any underlying illnesses so it can affect some people more than others as we get older we're more likely to have other underlying illnesses we call them heart disease or lung disease that put us at increased risk as well and so all of those things compound your risk of having more severe illness and why vaccination becomes so much more important in older people as well so that's a little bit of a summary I am quite confident that we're not missing at least a lot of cases of people who have died related to COVID in the community Derek, do you have a follow up? Yes, looking at the data that you released of status by vaccination in the unvaccinated people who are contracting COVID-19 and dying it was considerably large number of people over 70 sort of represented in that group what new strategies are you looking at to try and reach that over 70 crowd to get vaccination what you've learned from this. It is as you know age is that most important risk factor but even younger people who are not yet protected with any vaccine also are more likely to end up in hospital or have severe illness or die from COVID all of the various strains even with Omicron it is the same thing that we're doing we've been trying to go even door to door many cases but community to community working with community leaders getting that message out to people where they might hear it it goes back to the same things that we've seen all along that there's one of the things confidence in the vaccine and there's some people that don't believe that they need a vaccine which is unfortunate and there's a small group of people that we probably the other part is confidence in safety and we have more vaccines coming of different types that may help for some people part of its complacency people don't feel that it would affect them that they're fine that they don't need it and so that's something we try and address by putting out the information around who is most likely at risk and then convenience so making it easy for somebody to get that vaccine and anybody of any age who has made that important decision to get your first dose you can walk into any clinic any pharmacy that has vaccine anywhere in the province and get your vaccine now think about it today it's going to make a difference in getting through this next few weeks but it's going to make a difference for how we're going to be able to live with this virus in whatever happens next to over to Minister Dix just to say the over 70 category and one of the differences between that category and younger children is that there's actually very little regional difference Derek there's a very high level of immunization over 70 in the northern health 30 interior health 30 in all of our health 30's across BC I think it's close to in the interior in the northern health 30 I think it's about 88 89 there and obviously province wide is 93% which is a very high level of vaccination 93% of people over 70 have got their first dose 91% plus have their second dose and of those 91% about 85 86% of those have got their third dose and so what I'd say today to those people first of all the 45,000 people who've received invitations to book who are over 70 for their booster dose received an invitation to book that group of people has already received two doses so they are they are by definition interested in the vaccine now is the time to get that additional protection and if you need any more evidence that was provided by Dr Henry last Friday I don't I think I'm sure there will be people including your family doctor including pharmacists people in the community who can provide that to you with respect to the small group of people over 70 and over 60 who have not received their first dose we just have to continue to make the effort to let them know that any time someone in that category wants to be vaccinated at our hundreds of locations across British Columbia of our new locations the pharmacies are giving booster dose hundreds of locations across BC they can get vaccinated today we are in that risk category and there are some and we just have to continue to drive that we saw the impact of the Delta variant for months and months and months on unvaccinated people how they had to be flown in many cases hundreds and hundreds of miles from their home to get critical care in many cases passing away right and so people need to get vaccinated first and second dose we just got to continue to tell them millions and millions of people more than 10 million doses have been administered in BC so far across the country significantly more than that I think the number is more than 80 million across the country across the world in the billions these are some of the safest vaccines we have and we are here ready for you today is the best day to choose to get vaccinated we have time for one more question about BC Hi there in English and in French please Doctor Henry we are wondering what rules for non-church quires in BC under the current guidelines if you could clarify please if such quires can rehearse in person right now if they have all the safety protocols vaccination, masking, distancing would such a rehearsal be allowed under the current public health order there is no restrictions on quires but no we haven't made any distinctions between singing groups in any setting but obviously there is space and we have guidelines about how to do it safely mask wearing over to Minister Dix there is no difference in groups right now there is no regulation but we have to be careful not to use masks of course and to follow a plan of protection for people and that is essential and that is what we have to do now Belle do you have a follow up Yes please the sub variant of Omicron is it in BC and if so what does that mean in terms of the provinces response to the pandemic and English and French please Yes so we have had a few cases of the as 4.2 I think it is we our first detection was about two weeks ago very small number so it is not a significant difference right now and there is still a whole lot we don't know we have seen in the UK particularly where they have seen it in pockets that there is probably increased transmissibility whether that translates into any other parameters that are different there hasn't been enough of it certainly not here and not in Canada to really see any impact we are not seeing it we have been following my lab team has been following it really carefully and we are not seeing it taking over from Omicron as we saw Omicron take over from Delta for example very similar to what we saw here where you get regional differences in variants if we look back at Delta for example we had regional ones that were here in western Canada 25 and 27 that were different from other places and that just is because the virus mutates a little bit in different areas geographically when it is spreading that rapidly so yet to know really what the overall impact is going to be if any Over to Minister Dix Yes we found a few cases two weeks ago and there are very few cases in the UK but very few here we saw some Delta and it depended on the part of the country or the province but in general we do not have the time to take conclusions but we are waiting to see that there are the truth and that was the case with other variants of concern and it is the case with Omicron variant of concern so few cases but very few here Thank you very much