COVID cases and news for Nova Scotia on Tuesday, Aug 3

NOTE: This day is now over. Click for the latest on COVID-19 from The Coast. Or for an informative look back at Nova Scotia's evolving pandemic response, keep on reading.

Back from break with 6 new cases (we’ve got male)

In its first COVID update since taking the weekend/Emancipation Day/Natal Day holiday off, the province is reporting six new infections and three recoveries. With a net increase of three new cases, Nova Scotia's active caseload is up to 12 active cases.

Six new cases is a lot for NS right now. There were seven cases about two weeks ago, on Wednesday, July 21, and four weeks ago—Tuesday, July 6—was another seven; today is the next-highest total in recent weeks. But even though today's report has six cases, that's not necessarily six cases in a single day, because this report's covering diagnoses from Friday, Saturday, Sunday and the Monday holiday, or an average of 1.5 new cases per day. Unhelpfully, the province doesn't give any indication of when these cases were diagnosed.

"Three of the cases are in Central Zone. One is related to travel, one is a close contact of a previously reported case and one is under investigation," is the only detail the province's Tuesday COVID report gives. "Two cases are in Western Zone, and both are related to travel. One case is in Northern Zone and is related to travel." It is good to know that only one of the six cases is being investigated as a possible case of community spread.

Our ever-popular map and table of cases in Nova Scotia's community health networks show the six new cases are spread across four areas: Halifax community network with three cases, and one each in the Yarmouth/Shelburne/Digby, Annapolis Valley and Pictou County networks. This is only the 16th case of the pandemic for Yarmouth/Shelburn/Digby, the least-infected part of the province, which had gone 70 days in a row without an infection before today.

More Coast analysis, tracking the province's case demographic information, finds that all six reported cases were diagnosed in men. One is between the ages of 0 and 19, the other five guys are in the 60-to-79 cohort. Which of these men live in which health network, and whose case is under investigation, is unknown to the public.

As in Friday's report, one person is in hospital due to COVID, sick enough that they're in the ICU.

COVID testing over the holiday weekend was about average most days—consistently lower than average to be sure, although not too far off—but on the holiday Monday it dropped even further. At just 1,607 tests completed, this was the lowest testing level since April 6, four months ago on the other side of Nova Scotia's third-wave spike of infections. The current daily average is now about 2,400 tests.

Vaccinations also seriously slowed down on the weekend. Clinics across the province delivered a total of 15,259 jabs over the four days, lower than the amount injected last Wednesday alone. In keeping with the recent trend, most of the vaccines went to people getting their second dose. Only 419 people per day (on average) received their first dose, the lowest level of first-dose penetration the province has recorded since February 1, before the vaccine rollout really started rolling.

As shown on The Coast's chart of Nova Scotia's vaccination rate, nearly 64 percent of the provincial population has been fully vaxxed with both doses. In vax penetration, slightly more than 76 percent of Nova Scotians have received at least one dose, a number that is levelling off as the rate of increase slows to a crawl.

This infographic was created by The Coast using daily case data from Nova Scotia's official COVID-19 dashboard. Our goal is for this to be the best NS COVID map around, clearer and more informative than the province or any other media organization provides. To get there we do an analysis of the data to find each day's new and resolved case numbers in the 14 community health networks, information the province does not provide. For a different but still highly accessible approach to the latest COVID statistics, check out our case table. Note: On July 23, 2021, Nova Scotia announced that it will no longer update case numbers on weekends.

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The Coast uses data logged from Nova Scotia's official COVID-19 dashboard in order to provide this tabulated breakdown. The province reports the number of active cases in each of Nova Scotia's 14 community health networks, but we do the math to be able to report the new and resolved case numbers. We also map the data to provide a different view of the case information. Note: Effective July 23, 2021, the province no longer updates case numbers on weekends.

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This interactive graph charts COVID activity in Nova Scotia's third wave, comparing daily new cases with that day’s active caseload. The dark line tracks the rise and fall of new infections reported by the province, which hit a Nova Scotian pandemic record high of 227 cases in a single day on May 7. The green area is the province's caseload, which peaked May 10 at 1,655 active cases. Click or however over any point on the graph and the detail for that moment will pop up. To focus on just new or active cases, you can click the legend at the top left of the graph to hide or reveal that data set. Note: As of July 23, 2021, the province stopped updating case numbers on weekends.

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How many Nova Scotians already have one dose of vaccine? How many are fully vaccinated with two doses? And how close are we to the herd immunity goal of 75 percent of the province fully vaxxed? These questions are answered in our chart of the vaccination rate in Nova Scotia since the province started reporting these numbers in January 2021, breaking out people who've had a single dose separate from those who've had the full complement of two doses. (Here's more information about the 75 percent target and what it will take to get there.) Note: The province doesn't update vaccination numbers on weekends.

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Click here for the most recent previous COVID-19 news roundup, for Friday, July 30, 2021.