How Alberta’s COVID numbers stack up with other provinces

By GILLIAN SLADE on August 18, 2020.

gslade@medicinehatnews.com@MHNGillianSlade

One glance at the number of COVID-19 cases in each province and it looks as though Alberta is not doing that great – but there is more to the story.

The population in each province varies and so do the number of tests. Ultimately it is the number of tests that determines the number of positive cases identified.

As of Monday morning, British Columbia has identified 4,274 positive cases of COVID-19, while Alberta has 11,969, Saskatchewan 1,511, Manitoba 603 and Ontario 40,367.

The number of tests done in each province varies considerably.

– B.C. has done 300,230 tests on a population 5.07 million, which means 5.9 per cent of the population has been tested.

– Alberta has done 801,360 tests and has a population of 4.42 million, which means 18 per cent of Albertans have been tested.

– Saskatchewan has done 120,486 tests on a population of 1.17 million, which means 10.3 per cent of its population has been tested.

– Manitoba has done 112,283 tests on a population of 1.27 million, which means 8.8 per cent of its population has been tested.

– Ontario has done 2,608,219 tests on a population of 14.57 million, meaning 17.9 per cent of the population has been tested.

From this data Alberta is slightly ahead of Ontario in terms of per capita testing.

Now let’s look at the number of positive cases based on the number of tests carried out:

– B.C. 4,311 cases from 300,230 tests: 1.4 per cent were positive.

– Alberta 12,053 from 801,360 tests: 1.5 per cent were positive.

– Saskatchewan 1,566 cases from 120,486 tests: 1.3 per cent were positive.

– Manitoba 697 cases from 112,283 tests: .62 per cent were positive.

– Ontario 40,745 cases from 2,608,219 tests: 1.5 per cent were positive.

It is important to know not all provinces are using the same testing methods and the above data does not take into account how many people tested were asymptomatic.

The number of reported COVID deaths in relation of the total number of positive cases:

– B.C. 196 deaths from 4,311 cases: 4.5 per cent death rate.

– Alberta 221 deaths from 12,053 cases: 1.8 per cent death rate.

– Saskatchewan 21 deaths from 1,566 cases: 1.3 per cent death rate.

– Manitoba nine deaths from 697 cases: 1.3 per cent death rate.

– Ontario 2,789 deaths from 40,745 cases: 6.8 per cent death rate.

It is unknown if every province is collecting data in the same manner.

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