March 3, 2021

THIS IS A GREY AREA AFTER ALL — WITH NO MUSKOKA CASES TODAY

SIMCOE-MUSKOKA — Muskoka had no COVID cases today, Simcoe had 18 or 36 depending on which site you go to — and Toronto and Peel are battling over grey zone designations as variants rise.

Needless to say needles are the real story of the day no matter your age or where you live.

But the weather’s easier to predict than what’s going to happen with vaccines.

And we pay these people?

We’ll leave that up to you to sort out for today.

Mixed messages aside, there was more good news from the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit (SMDHU):

No new deaths, but still 18 people are in hospital, 1 more than yesterday.

Provincially, numbers remained below a thousand again at 958 and 17 deaths.

Toronto and Peel, which want to join Simcoe-Muskoka in the area where grey matters, reported 249 and 164 cases respectively.

Neighbouring York remained in the red at 92.

North Bay-Parry Sound jumped to 2 and Thunder Bay 30.

Meanwhile, local public health did hold its second vaccination day this week in Muskoka.

The Sportsplex at Bracebridge, which has been a bookie’s dream for days, was teeming with seniors racing their walkers to get inoculated with a best-before vaccine date of Canada Day.

Here’s hoping they get to celebrate fireworks out of doors and far from home.

SMDHU isn’t announcing where each day’s clinics are or exactly how many vaccines are available to them (about 1,000) each day.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau hailed the arrival today of 500,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine. But who will get it and when and when again remains an enigma wrapped in a COVID conundrum.

HEALTH UNIT HIGHTLIGHTS:

To date 205 local cases have been tested positive for the COVID-19 variant of concern UK B.1.1.7 and an additional 378 cases have screened positive (awaiting confirmatory testing)
More than 44,078 Pfizer vaccine doses have been administered in Simcoe Muskoka, 1,382 of them yesterday including at new vaccine locations.
There have been 72 new cases reported to the health unit for the current week.

IN OTHER COVID NEWS …

Texas, Mississippi moving to lift mask requirements, as almost 52 million Americans have gotten at least first jab.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, caught in COVID scandal, admits sexual misconduct, but says he won’t resign.

Trudeau extends Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy and the Canada Emergency Rent Subsidy until June.