Four new COVID-19 cases reported in Tillsonburg
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Four new COVID-19 cases were reported in Tillsonburg on the weekend.
An employee at the Woodingford Lodge site in Tillsonburg tested positive. Woodingford notified residents and family on Sunday that the home is in ‘outbreak status’ and is closed to visitors.
All residents who had contact with the employee were tested Sunday and staff working in the area began testing on Monday. Enhanced infection and outbreak control measures have been put into place.
Woodingford Lodge sites in Woodstock and Ingersoll were not affected. For future updates visit www.oxfordcounty.ca/woodingford.
On Saturday, one staff member at Maple Manor Nursing Home tested positive.
On Sunday, Thames Valley District School Board confirmed one new active COVID-19 case at Westfield Public School and one at South Ridge Public School.
Thames Valley immediately notified staff, and parents and guardians of all South Ridge and Westfield students. The schools will remain open and school buses will continue to operate.
If you were not contacted by the health unit, your child is not considered to be at risk. The health unit only contacts staff and students who have been identified as a ‘close contact’ and advises them to stay home from school and quarantine for a period of 14 days.
For more information, visit https://www.swpublichealth.ca/covid-19-school-support or call Southwestern Public Health’s COVID-19 Information Line at 1-800-922-0096 ext. 9.
As of Monday, Tillsonburg had seven active COVID-19 cases.
SWP reported 142 active cases in the Oxford-Elgin region, including 32 in St. Thomas, 26 in Aylmer, and 21 in Norwich Township.
Three cases in the Oxford-Elgin were hospitalized as of last Thursday, including two in the ICU. Hospitalization numbers are updated weekly on Thursdays.
The COVID-19 assessment centre in Tillsonburg (17 Bear Street) tested 353 individuals last week.
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On Monday, Southwestern Public Health’s Medical Officer of Health reached out with a recommendation for household members awaiting COVID-19 test results: stay home.
“COVID-19 spreads when people have close contact with each other. Our case history has many examples of multi-member households infected with the virus. For this reason, we’re asking everyone in the household to stay home until COVID is ruled out for the symptomatic individual,” said Dr. Joyce Lock, Medical Officer of Health at Southwestern Public Health, in a media release. “We must all work together to break the trend of household members unknowingly bringing COVID-19 to their workplace, to schools, and the broader community.”
Under the new recommendation, entire households are asked to self-isolate alongside their symptomatic household member until COVID-19 can be ruled out. Dr. Lock recommends that no one in the household should attend work or school outside of the home, attend childcare, or run errands in the community while results are pending.
The advice comes as the health unit’s local epidemiology data indicates 30% of the region’s cases acquired COVID-19 at home. Until now, household members of a symptomatic individual could go out into the community or work, even if a household member was unwell.
Effective Dec. 14, Dr. Lock recommends the following measures:
Get tested for COVID-19 if you have symptoms, even if they are mild.
Self-isolate at home while you wait to receive your COVID-19 test results. Do not go to work or school outside of the home, attend childcare, or run errands in the community until your test results rule out COVID-19.
Self-isolate if you live with a symptomatic individual waiting for test results.
If negative, discontinue self-isolation; if positive, continue isolating as directed by public health.
If an individual is sick but chooses not to get tested, all household members are advised to self-isolate for at least 14 days.
For more information, visit www.swpublichealth.ca/covid19 or call the Southwestern Public Health COVID-19 Call Centre at 1-800-922-0096 ext. 9.
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