VANCOUVER -- The B.C. Centre for Disease Control has released its weekly map showing the locations of COVID-19 infections across the province.
The centre released its first such map of cases by local health area last week, displaying data on infections that happened between Nov. 29 and Dec. 5. This week's map shows the locations of cases confirmed between Dec. 6 and Dec. 12.
The BCCDC only recently began releasing data on infections by "local health area" on a weekly basis. Before this month, the centre only released such data monthly.
In the latest map, the City of Surrey is still the epicentre of the pandemic in B.C., with nearly 1,500 new cases of the coronavirus recorded last week. That represents a slight improvement from the previous week, when 1,588 infections were recorded in the local health area that includes most of the city.
On both maps, Surrey is coloured in the darkest shade of red, corresponding to more than 20 new cases per 100,000 residents per day during the week in question.
In the most recent map, Surrey is joined by the City of Abbotsford, where 341 total cases were detected between Dec. 6 and Dec. 12. Abbotsford is the only other local health area in the Lower Mainland with more than 20 daily cases per 100,000 last week.
Elsewhere in B.C., three regions in Interior Health and three in Northern Health recorded a similarly high number of per-capita cases in the last week, though their raw case numbers varied dramatically.
In Interior Health, the Central Okanagan local health area, which includes the City of Kelowna, recorded 349 cases in the most recent week of data. That's a slight increase from the previous week, when there were 314 cases in the region. Both of those totals equate to more than 20 cases per 100,000 residents per day.
Interior Health's South Okanagan and Kettle Valley areas also reached that highest level of per-capita cases in the most recent map, but with notably fewer cases of COVID-19, overall. Kettle Valley recorded 11 cases between Dec. 6 and Dec. 12, while South Okanagan recorded 54.
Both of those totals represent significant increases in cases compared to the previous week. Kettle Valley's new cases nearly doubled from six detected between Nov. 29 and Dec. 5, while South Okanagan's new cases grew six-fold. That region recorded just nine new infections in the week ending Dec. 5.
In Northern Health, the three regions with more than 20 cases per 100,000 residents are Nechako, Upper Skeena and Nisga'a. They detected 43, nine and four new cases of the coronavirus, respectively, during the week that ended on Dec. 12.
Those totals represent increases compared to the previous week for Nechako and Upper Skeena, but a decrease for Nisga'a, which recorded 11 cases from Nov. 29 to Dec. 5.
The full-size version of the most recent case map can be found on the BCCDC website.
