30 new COVID-19 cases reported in Sask.

REGINA -

The Saskatchewan government confirmed 30 new cases of COVID-19 Thursday, along with nine recoveries and no additional deaths for the fourth day in a row.

The new cases are in the Far Northwest (three); Far North Central (one); Far Northeast (five); Northwest (four); Northeast (one); Saskatoon (one); Central West (four); Central East (one); Regina (four); Southwest (one); and Southeast (one) zones. Four cases are pending location information.

There are 52 COVID-19 patients in hospital, which is the lowest number since Nov. 12, 2020. Nine of those patients are in the ICU in the North Central (one); Saskatoon (five); and Regina (three) zones.

The seven-day average of daily new cases is 27 – a number not seen since Oct. 13, 2020. There are 373 active cases across the province.

VACCINATIONS

There were 7,787 more doses of COVID-19 vaccine given across the province. As of Thursday, 1,321,210 shots have been administered so far.

According to provincial data, 73 per cent of eligible residents age 12 and older have their first dose, and 57 per cent are fully vaccinated.

VARIANTS OF CONCERN

The government said labs have identified a total of 12,289 COVID-19 cases as variants of concern.

As of Tuesday, 7,747 variant cases have been confirmed through whole genome sequencing. Of those cases, 6,952 are Alpha (B.1.1.7), 408 are Gamma (P.1), 377 are Delta (B.1.617.2) and 10 are Beta (B.1.351).