Some good news in the COVID-19 fight in Delta.
Delta View Care Centre, an East Delta long-term care facility still has only one confirmed case – an employee who tested positive for COVID-19. That confirmation came on Saturday, March 21.
The 296-bed facility on Burns Drive consists of two care homes -- the 216-bed Delta View Life Enrichment Centre and the 80-bed Delta View Habilitation Centre.
Health measures put in place at long-term care facilities at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic is helping to stem the tide of outbreaks at others say health officials from Fraser Health.
“When we started seeing cases arising in Vancouver Coastal, we already implemented measures to prevent these cases in the first place,” said Dr. Martin Lavoie, Fraser Health’s chief medical health officer. “All of our long-term care facilities were putting in measures that would reduce the risk and if it was detected we could act very quickly.”
Fraser Health has proactively implemented the following at all its facilities:
· Staffing levels will be maintained to provide resident care
· Visitors have been limited to only essential visitors
· Staff and residents movement in the facility has been restricted
· Cleaning and infection control measures have been enhanced
· Residents, families and staff are being notified
· Twice a day screening of all staff and residents.
B.C. seniors advocate Isobel Mackenzie told the Optimist there’s understandably much concern about the impacts to long-term care facilities.
“One of the reasons why we didn’t want to implement visitor restrictions until necessary was because they’ll be there for a while and we know that the transmission in the care homes has come from the visitors, but I know we didn’t wait too long to restrict visitors,” she said.
“In any given year, about 20-to-25 percent of our residents in long-term care pass away. So if you think about a restriction on visitors for two or three months, people who pass away may not be seeing their families. There are some very controlled circumstances under which a person can visit their loved ones but you can’t have everyone in.”
