Another death in the nursing home
Photo: Contributed
Spring Valley Care Center
Another COVID-related death occurred at the Spring Valley long-term care home in Kelowna.
Interior Health announced on Wednesday that a seventh person who contracted COVID-19 in the nursing home has died. In addition, another resident of the home tested positive for the virus, bringing the total number of cases to 33 residents and 12 staff / others.
Despite the increasing cases and deaths, Interior Health’s chief medical health officer, Dr. Albert de Villiers, the COVID-19 vaccine was effective in the outbreak. He found that elderly people who have been vaccinated but still contract COVID-19 and die in long-term care homes may have minor symptoms of the virus itself.
“There are people with multiple comorbidities who end up getting COVID, and sometimes COVID is the last straw that kind of pushes them over the edge,” said Dr. De Villiers last Friday.
“They can get asymptomatic COVID infection, and it’s just an incidental finding a few days or weeks before they sadly die.”
Citing data protection concerns, Dr. De Villiers did not provide details of the Spring Valley deaths.
Over the weekend, the COVID-19 outbreak at Sandalwood Retirement Resort was declared over after two residents of the facility died. Another active internal health outbreak persists at Keremeos’ Orchard Haven long-term care home, with only one resident and one employee testing positive.
While active COVID-19 cases across the province have steadily declined in recent weeks, that number has increased slightly inside in recent days. There are 495 active cases as of Wednesday. Nineteen people in the area are being hospitalized, 13 of whom are being treated in the intensive care unit.
