‘COVID DEATH’ PATIENT DIDN’T ‘PRESENT’ AT MUSKOKA HOSPITALS
Mark Clairmont | MuskokaTODAY.com
MUSKOKA — Ontario’s first death linked to the coronavirus nevery “presented” in Muskoka.
“We know nothing about this,” Allyson Snelling, Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare’s corporate communications officer told MuskokaTODAY.com on Tuesday.
Confusion earlier that day around national news that a “Muskoka” man in his 70s was COVID’s first victim in the province.
Ontario’s Health Minister Christine Elliott didn’t deny in a TV interview yesterday morning.
“We know nothing about this,” Snelling said when asked about it Tuesday.
“That is correct — no presentation at MAHC of the Barrie resident/patient,” she said, referring instead to a news release Sunday from Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit (SMDHU).
In an afternoon news briefing, Dr. Charles Gardner told the media the man was a Barrie resident and that he had earlier told the health ministry that.
In his March 15 statement, Gardner had said: “A man in his 70s presented to Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre (RVH) in Barrie on Wednesday March 11.
“The patient is being treated at RVH. RVH has tracked the movement of the patient throughout the health centre and have notified staff and physicians who may have been exposed to the patient. The individual was in close contact with a second RVH patient who died March 11th.”
The victim was 77 who tested positive after his death for the virus, say health officials.
Ontario’s coroner’s office is investigating to confirm his cause of death.
Gardner said the death is currently under investigation by SMDHU and it is investigating the patients’ contacts in the community and will provide appropriate follow-up with people who may have been in contact with them.
The confirmed residence of the victim south of here should temporarily allay local fears of the virus being identified in Muskoka, which has many residents here concerned for their health with wintering snowbird seniors flying home after wintering out of the country.
Those returning from abroad have been ordered by Ottawa to self-isolate for 14 days — and to continue social-distancing like all Canadians in the coming months.
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