Manitoba ready for increased COVID-19 vaccine delivery

Manitoba is expanding its capacity to inoculate people against COVID-19 to such an extent that it could provide vaccine to every adult in the province before May - if there are enough doses in the national supply chain.

753 Manitobans have died since COVID-19 first arrived in the province.

"We are headed in a good direction ... the actions taken by Manitobans is making a difference", he said at a Wednesday press conference.

The Brandon site is the second large vaccination centre to open in Manitoba, after one opened at the RBC Convention Centre in Winnipeg last week.

There have been 28,080 doses of Pfizer vaccine shipped to sites in Winnipeg and Brandon, as well as to personal care homes across the province. There are 595 people on top of that who have been assigned to the vaccine campaign from regional health authorities.

The province is reporting five deaths today from COVID-19, three of them in Winnipeg.

The total number of lab-confirmed cases in Manitoba is 26,695.

Dr. Jazz Atwal, acting deputy chief public health officer, said the numbers are encouraging but there are still areas of concern, including high case numbers in northern communities such as Thompson and Lynn Lake.

Wednesday's list of new infections come from across the province and include 61 cases in the Winnipeg Health region, eight cases in the Southern Health region, 12 cases in the Prairie Mountain Health region, 70 cases in the Northern Health region, and seven cases in the Interlake-Eastern Health region.