COVID-19 is advancing at a steady pace throughout B.C. with 446 new cases in the last 24 hours. That’s roughly the same number of new cases as has been recorded each day this month.

The Interior Health region is also keeping pace with 44 new cases, according to provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry during a news briefing today, Feb. 12.

Health officials have administered 162,982 doses of vaccines including 17,562 second doses, which has gone a long way towards decreasing the number of new cases and deaths in long-term care and assisted living homes, Dr. Henry said.

Supplies of the Pfizer vaccine are expected to increase next week after having been cut back over the past couple of weeks.

“We expect to have a significant bump in supplies in the coming weeks,” she said. “This will allow us to resume our province-wide immunization program.”

That will mean being able to move out into the community to soon start vaccinating those who are 80 years and older.

“We are trending in the right direction,” Dr. Henry said. “We’re pushing our curve down, but slowly. This means staying the course. This weekend we need to pay particular attention to ensure the progress we have made is not wasted. Mother nature is going to be on our side there as it’s going to be a very challenging weekend for people to travel.”

To date, there have been 46 cases of variants of concern, including 29 of the variant first found in the United Kingdom and 17 of the one first found in South Africa.

There is also one person who returned from Nigeria who was infected by a different variant there. That person lives in the interior Health region, Dr. Henry said. No one else has, so far, been infected by that person.

Of the 445 new cases in B.C., 218 were in the Fraser Health region, 135 in Vancouver Coastal, 15 on Vancouver Island, 44 in the Northern Health region and three in people who normally reside outside of Canada.

There were 10 new deaths, bringing that total to 1,288. One of those deaths was at the Heritage Retirement Residence in West Kelowna.

There are 4,347 active cases in B.C. with 226 people in hospital, 61 of whom are in intensive care.

— This story was updated at 4:18 p.m. Friday, Feb. 12, 2021 to add information about the Nigerian variant.

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