There were seven more deaths linked to COVID-19 reported in Saskatchewan Friday afternoon. Since the start of the pandemic in the province, back in March of 2020, there have now been 637 deaths connected to the virus.  

There were 472 new cases reported throughout the province, 383 of those were people who are unvaccinated. There were 25 cases reported as partially vaccinated and 64 cases of those who are fully vaccinated. While the unvaccinated and partially vaccinated cases made up 86.4 percent of the reported cases Friday, those two groups in total represent 39.4 percent of the province’s population.  

Of the new cases reported, 91 were under the age of 12, with another 224 between the ages of 12 and 390. There were 114 cases between the ages of 40 and 69, with 43 cases in the 70+ age group. Once again, the Saskatoon region had the most new cases with 80, followed by 60 in the North West, 554 in Regina, 48 in the South East region, 34 in the South Central, 27 in both the North Central and South West, 26 in the Far North East, 25 in the Central East, 23 in the North East, 16 in the Far North West and nine in the Central West. 

There were five new cases reported in the hospital, bringing the total number of people in the hospital receiving treatment for COVID-19 to 223. Of those cases, 50 are receiving treatment in intensive care. Currently, the province has 79 ICU beds available and is working to increase that capacity to up to 175 to alleviate some of the pressures off of the system, and to ensure the availability of beds for non-COVID patients.  

There were 3,287 doses of vaccine administered in the province, according to Friday’s report. This brings the total percentage of the province’s population that is completely vaccinated up to 60.6 percent.