Numbers of new COVID cases, deaths, hospitalizations all rise in Sask.

The key indicators for COVID-19 in Saskatchewan all rose during the latest reporting period.

In the weekly epidemiological report issued Thursday by the Ministry of Health, the number of new cases increased from 832 as of March 12 to 895 for the week ending Saturday.

The number of deaths reported by the province rose from 28 the previous week to 33 for the seven-day period that ended Saturday.

And there were 299 COVID-related hospitalizations reported for the week that ended March 16, but that number climbed to 306 as of Wednesday.

A look at the numbers

There were nine deaths reported in the Saskatoon region, with seven in the central-east zone, four in each of the Regina and south-central zones, three in the north-central region, two in the central-west area, and one in each of the north-central, northeast, southwest and southeast zones.

The government said 14 of the deaths happened during the week; the other 19 happened earlier but were only reported to authorities this week.

There were 22 deaths reported in the 80-and-older age group, five in the 70-to-79 age range, four in the 40-to-59 age group, and one in each of the 20-to-39 and 60-to-69 age ranges.

As of Saturday, 1,211 Saskatchewan residents had died due to COVID.

The new cases were reported in the Saskatoon (195), Regina (169), northwest (95), central-east (91), southeast (83), south-central (60), northeast (47), north-central (36), southwest (35), central-west (27), far northwest (13) and far northeast (eight) zones. The hometowns of 36 new cases were pending.

The number of new cases only included those detected in the 7,488 laboratory tests performed in the province. That resulted in a test positivity rate of 11.7 per cent, down 0.1 per cent from the previous week.

There were 19 people in intensive care in Saskatchewan health-care facilities, an increase of one from the previous week.

The total of 306 hospitalizations comprised 128 COVID-related illnesses, 158 incidental infections and 19 unknown cases.

There were 147 new lineage results reported, all of which were the Omicron variant. Of those, the BA.2 sublineage accounted for 25.9 per cent of the total, up from 5.4 per cent the previous week.

There were seven outbreaks reported in long-term care homes and three in personal care homes. That was the same total as was reported a week earlier.

As of March 19, 85.7 per cent of Saskatchewan residents aged five and up had received at least one dose of a two-dose COVID vaccine and 80.5 per cent had got two shots. Among those 18 years and older, 51.2 per cent had received at least one booster vaccination.