Rob: I’ve heard some rumours regarding a potential COVID-19 outbreak in Banff linked to the YWCA. Is there any truth to this?

Tanya: No, actually, I can say with certainty there is no outbreak at the YWCA. This rumour presents a great opportunity for us to address a number of things.

Rumors around infections have been running rampant since the middle of March. I have not been able to confirm a single rumor that people have brought to me. In this example, I’ve had a lot of people send me messages asking “Why is this being kept secret? Why don’t I see it in the Outlook?” If there are no facts around a rumour, you wouldn’t see a story about it.

Public health is very transparent about confirmed cases. Where they’re located, when outbreaks occur, and they report on them every day. If there was an outbreak at the YWCA in Banff, we would know about it, we would be talking about it. There would be stories in the news, but there’s not.

The YWCA has stepped up in this time to provide isolation and quarantine space for people in the community who need it, which means at any given time there could be a positive COVID taste at the YWCA, but that’s not a problem. That’s actually what we want. If people are isolating and we’re contact tracing, we are able to manage the spread. If there were to be an outbreak, we would know about it from Alberta Health Services.

Rob: That’s where I go to for a lot of the information. Like you mentioned, Dr. Deena Hinshaw talks about those outbreaks in our province. You can just go to the geospatial data on the interactive map and you can view where the active cases are. Right now in the Bow Valley, just like it’s been through pretty much this entire pandemic, those are low to none.

Filed under: Banff, covid-19, Mountain Insider