Cases increasing in Smoky Lake County and Goodfish Lake

No new COVID-19 deaths have been reported across the Lakeland in three days, but active cases in Smoky Lake County have tripled in the past week.

Under the municipality view of the province’s COVID-19 data map, Smoky Lake County now has 109 active cases of the virus. The bulk of those cases are located on the Goodfish Lake First Nation, which is under an outbreak status and reported 93 active cases as of the end of the day Feb. 24.

According to information released by the Nation, they had 3 positive cases on Feb. 15. Approximately 400 people are currently isolating because of the outbreak. According to the Nation’s website, there are approximately 1,778 on-reserve members.

Lakeland Connect has reached out to the director of emergency management for more information.

Ashmont School will extend at-home learning for Kindergarten to Grade 6 students until March 9. The school is listed under “outbreak” status on the province’s school status map, which means there is at least five cases linked to the facility.

Elsewhere in the Lakeland case counts are stable or declining. Lac La Biche has 13 active cases, Bonnyville has 25 active cases, Cold Lake has 28 active cases, St. Paul has 44 active cases, Two Hills has one active case, and Vermilion has three active cases.

Province-wide, there was an increase of 399 cases in the past 24 hours and eight new deaths reported on Thursday. There are currently 280 people hospitalized with the virus including 56 in the intensive care units.