Thought of the Day - June 21 - By The Numbers

This week Canada added 2,609 cases (bringing the total over the 100,000 milestone), and 303 deaths (the majority in Quebec).

Thus the number of total active cases across the country is came down by over 1,800 from last week's figure.

Despite the significant number of active cases and deaths, Quebec continues to make minor gains. They will probably be on par with Ontario in new cases per capita soon, and hopefully can make strides is addressing their very high rate of death per case.

In BC we had our best week in months, with no deaths. BC also only added 81 new cases and so our active came count came down by 9. It looking good for Phase 3 reopening soon.

So while there is reason for optimism across the country we should not lose sight of the fact that outside Canada by and large things are not improving.

South of the border the US is still struggling. For example while Canada had 69 new cases per million population last week the US added 562, almost ten times more (this can only partially be attributed to their more extensive testing program). In deaths the difference is less pronounced (8 deaths per million verses 14) but this margin will grow in the coming weeks due to the larger, and increasing number, of active cases in the US.

Globally things still continue to worsen. The spread of the virus is still accelerating. The world is adding 150,000 cases a day now (up from 100,000 a day this time last month). A number of Latin American counties have shot past Canada's numbers in recent weeks as they become the most recent epicentre.

This week's shout out goes to BC, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, who this week joined NFLD, PEI, Manitoba and the Territories in having no new deaths.

Cheers

Cliff