Alberta Health Minister provides update on COVID-19 vaccine rollout on Wednesday

Alberta’s Health Minister will provide an update on COVID-19 Wednesday afternoon.

Jason Copping is scheduled to speak at 3:30 p.m. Global News will live stream the press conference in this story post.

In a media statement about the press conference, the province said Copping will provide updates on the province’s vaccine rollout.

While other details were not released, Premier Jason Kenney said on Monday that “we expect more news soon about the significant expansion of the population that injects the booster that is eligible.” there.”

Currently, all people 70 years of age and older are vaccinated with the COVID-19 vaccine, as are First Nations, Inuit and Métis who are 18 years of age or older. Immunocompromised persons 12 years of age or older with specific conditions, residents and elderly people with assisted living facilities, travelers to areas that do not recognize mixed doses of vaccine, a Some health care workers and other adults who have received AstraZeneca / Covishield or Janssen vaccines are also now eligible to receive a third dose of the vaccine.

Earlier this month, Health Canada approved booster doses of both the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine and the Moderna vaccine for all adults 18 years of age and older. Both approvals state that six months will pass between an individual receiving a second and a third dose.

On Monday, Kenney said “we won’t start giving booster shots to people until they’ve passed that six months, except in a few unique cases.”

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Kenney also stated that the majority of Albertans will hit that six-month mark in December.

The media announcement of availability Wednesday did not list Alberta’s chief medical officer, Dr. Deena Hinshaw, as a participant.

On Tuesday, Hinshaw announced that Alberta had identified the first cast of the COVID-19 variant of Omicron it was interested in.

Hinshaw said an individual returning from Nigeria and the Netherlands “about a week ago” tested positive for the Omicron variant while showing no symptoms.

Also on Tuesday, Alberta identified 238 new cases of COVID-19. There are 434 people hospitalized with COVID-19, of which 81 are being treated in intensive care.

There are 4,545 active cases of COVID-19 in Alberta.

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