In an effort to be more transparent and help the people of Saskatchewan see how far their efforts have already gone when it comes to limiting COVID-19, the Saskatchewan Health Authority released the next phase of their COVID-19 response pan to the public on the morning of Wednesday, April 8.

"Modeling data released today by the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA)," the province said in a statement, "indicates that the key variable for saving lives and protecting health care workers during the COVID-19 pandemic is public compliance with prescribed isolation measures, physical distancing, effective hand washing and staying home, whenever and wherever possible. It also indicates that current interventions are making a difference."

The SHA has set up 38 testing sites around the province and said they have tripled staff available for contact tracing efforts in an effort to prevent community transmission. So far, many of the cases in Saskatchewan (which has a total of 253 as of this writing) have been travel-related.

“Our job as a health care system is to provide care for those in need and to be ready for any scenario,” SHA CEO Scott Livingstone said. “While we understand Canadian data is starting to show some hopeful signs about flattening the curve on COVID-19, it is critical to remember not to be complacent. We need to continue to escalate our response to ensure we are prepared for the worst-case scenarios and we need the public to help us avoid those scenarios.”

The SHA said they don't expect all their proposed changes to happen immediately, but some changes to healthcare are coming. For instance, they are designating some hospitals as COVID-19 hospitals. According to their release, as many as 20 of the province's 65 hospitals could be used for this purpose.

In addition, designated areas for COVID-19 patients within other hospitals and the construction of field hospitals are on the provincial agenda. "A slowdown of non-essential services to increase bed availability has already created acute care capacity across the system for handling a surge in COVID-19 related cases at future stages of the pandemic," they said.

“We wanted to be transparent with the plan going forward so the public is aware of the escalated measures we will put into place if needed, but it is critical to remember that many of the changes proposed in this plan will be implemented only in response to anticipated surges in patient demand that start to exceed our capacity,” Livingstone said. “Changes like conversion to COVID-19 dedicated hospitals will only occur where it is absolutely required to ensure safety and maintain access for patients who need our care.”

Saskatchewan residents can learn more at www.saskatchewan.ca/covid19.