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Bars, restaurants, and anywhere people interact indoors with shared air is where COVID -19 is more likely to spread, says an Edmonton infectious disease specialist.

On Tuesday, Premier Jason Kenney announced a ban on indoor social gatherings in any setting across the province, but in-person dining at restaurants can continue with a maximum of six people from the same house-hold per table.

Dr. Leyla Asadi says all inter-actions should be looked at as a potential source of transmission

and limited as much as possible.“If you’re in a setting where

your mask can’t be on, then it’s a higher-risk situation,” Asadi said.

“Six feet isn’t a magical num-ber. There is spread beyond that sometimes when the conditions are right or poor ventilation, for instance, or if the individual is symptomatic and is coughing.

“I think taken all together, it suggests that the bars and restau-rants and coffee shops are places where transmission certainly can occur.”

While the province has re-peatedly said little spread of COVID -19 is happening within the hospitality sector, Asadi said

it’s not that simple. She said con-tact tracing, which helps identify where transmission occurred, is very challenging and govern-ments can’t rely on just their own data, they need to be looking at other jurisdictions.

In the United States, for exam-ple, there are studies using loca-tion data from mobile phones that show bars, restaurants and hotels have been sources of COVID-19 transmission.

“I don’t think that we can say, ‘Oh, because we didn’t see that many transmissions before, the transmissions didn’t occur.’ I question whether the retrospec-tive contact tracing that we did was sufficient to allow us to know where exactly our transmissions were happening,” Asadi said.

Asadi used the example of some-one visiting a poorly ventilated restaurant while sick to illustrate the difficulties of contact tracing. “You don’t know who the others were in that space,” she said.

‘Six feet isn’t a magical number’: Eateries should be closed, doctor says

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nAt h A n M A rt i n

The province of Alberta sees active cases of COVID-19 continue to rise as 1,609 more were confirmed on Sunday.

The Edmonton Zone saw 262 more active cases and the Calgary Zone had 310 more active cases.

Across the province, there were more than 23,000 completed tests, bringing the total to 2,234,470, and 1,464,897 people have been tested in the province.

The Edmonton Zone has an addi-tional 14 people in hospital, bring-ing the total up to 222, with 50 in intensive care.

An additional nine deaths across the province were announced on Sunday, six of those in the Edmon-ton Zone. From Nov. 25 to 27 a male in his 80s, a female in her 80s, a male in his 70s, a female in her 90s and a male in his 90s died, all five linked to an outbreak at the Edmonton Chi-natown Care Centre. The death of a male in his 80s on Nov. 28 is linked

to an outbreak at Laurel Heights Re-tirement Residence in Edmonton.

Elsewhere in the province, the death of a male in his 90s on Nov. 27 was linked to an outbreak at West-lock Continuing Care Centre in the North Zone. On Nov. 28 a male in his 90s died in the South Zone.

On Nov. 29 a male in his 80s died, linked to an outbreak at Clifton Manor in Calgary Zone.

Alberta’s chief medical officer of health Dr. Deena Hinshaw ad-dressed the deaths on Twitter Sunday.

“I want to extend my sympathies to everyone grieving a lost loved one today,” she said. “While we may be physically separated from each oth-

er, I strongly encourage you to reach out to your friends and family and stay connected virtually. We are all in this together — so please reach out to a loved one if you need to.”

There were 838 recovered cases in Alberta on Sunday bringing the total recovered cases to 40,219 in the province. This week Alberta Premier Jason Kenney declared a state of public health emergency, banning indoor private gatherings and moving grades 7-12 students to online learning as of Nov. 30.

The announcement also added new restrictions or limitations on outdoor gatherings, weddings, fu-nerals and places of worship.

1,609 new COVID-19 cases reportedEdmonton Zone sees 262 more active cases and province confirms nine more deaths

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