Yukon Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Brendan Hanley is encouraging Yukon to continue following health regulations, noting that while Yukoners can be optimistic about changes coming, it could still be some time before changes to restrictions are made.
Hanley spoke at an April 6 press conference about COVID, focusing his comments on the impact of both variants of the virus and vaccines. Other jurisdictions are seeing a surge in variants.
“I continue to be grateful to be in Yukon,” he said, noting the work of Yukon to follow health guidelines and self-isolation rules has helped ensure the territory’s COVID numbers remain low.
As other jurisdictions are moving to stricter restrictions to deal with variants of the virus, the territory is considering measures that could be loosened. Such decisions would be made by the next government.
While Hanley noted the benefits of the vaccine, he also stressed concerns that variants spread more easily, are more severe, can reinfect those who have already had COVID-19, and are having a greater impact on young people.
Hanley stressed the importance of the population getting vaccinated, noting that while he’s pleased to see more young people getting their first shot in the territory, he’d like those numbers to increase more.
As of April 6, there were no active cases in the Yukon.
A total of 37,193 Moderna vaccines have been administered. Of those 23,954 are first shots with 13,239 also getting their second shot, meaning 68 per cent of Yukoners eligible have received their first shot with 35 per cent receiving their second shot.
Vaccine teams are in rural Yukon this week as well as next week to continue administering the first and second shots in communities
Contact Stephanie Waddell at stephanie.waddell@yukon-news.com