Attendance used to monitor school COVID-19 outbreaks: Education Minister

• Schools to keep track of attendance to gauge possible outbreaks
• All businesses must have COVID Safety Plan
• Dr. Henry says it will be a challenging month

As schools get set to reopen after an extended break Monday, the government has laid out its plans to keep an eye on daily attendance as a way to monitor outbreaks.

It comes as all businesses are being ordered to have a COVID-19 Safety Plan, and while British Columbia’s top doctor said the coming month will be difficult because of a surge in Omicron COVID-19 cases, it doesn’t mean society has to shut down.

Speaking at a media briefing Friday afternoon, provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said the rapid spread of the variant of concern means everyone now knows someone who has been affected.

“That means this is going to be a challenging month,” she said. “But it doesn’t mean that we need to stop everything.”

Businesses must have plans

Henry said the government’s goal has always been to mitigate the virus, do the best it can to reduce serious illness and death, protect the health care system, and minimize disruption to society.

In ordering COVID-19 Safety Plans across all business and industry, she said it will allow businesses to continue to operate even as high levels of absenteeism take hold.

“As an employer, we know you have an obligation to do all you can to keep your employment environment safe, and your employees safe, and I know the vast majority of businesses have stepped up without hesitation and many have continued all of the measures from their COVID-19 Safety Plans from the previous iterations,” she said.

Red light not green light

Hundreds of thousands of rapid test kits are expected to arrive in B.C. next week, but Henry again reiterated these will be for at-risk people to confirm infection, and to be used, initially, in the K-12 school system.

“They are used as a red light, to help us understand if someone is positive… They are not being used as a green light to allow people to socialize, as we’ve seen them being used in other places,” she explained.

Meanwhile, Education Minister Jennifer Whiteside said with individual contact tracing no longer useful - given the rapid spread of the Omicron variant and its three-day incubation period - regular daily attendance figures will help determine any outbreaks in classrooms, across grades, or in entire buildings.

Attendance will determine school outbreak response

“I understand parents and caregivers want to know what’s going on in schools,” Whiteside said, noting a new method to monitor the virus in schools is now needed.

“That proxy will be school attendance,” she said. “Schools will be monitoring attendance rates closely and will notify public health and the school community if attendance dips noticeably below typical rates for this time of year."

She said individual schools, principals and superintendents know local attendance rates among students and staff and if a dip required public health needing to get involved.

Friday's COVID numbers

The numbers released by the province on Friday show 3,144 new COVID-19 cases, with 526 of those in the Interior, an increase of 118 compared to Thursday.

There are 44 people in hospital, an increase of six over the previous day, while the 24 people in critical care reflects a decrease of one.

The stats in the Interior and elsewhere in the province this week have not followed a consistent pattern of escalation. Experts have said the daily numbers may not accurately reflect the scale of transmission, in part due to testing limitations.

The new case numbers for the Interior were 408 on Thursday, 473 on Wednesday and 270 on Tuesday.