LONG SAULT – The Eastern Ontario Health Unit region has a second coronavirus outbreak at a long term care home, Cornwall Newswatch has learned.
Residents at Woodland Villa on Mille Roches Road in Long Sault were tested Wednesday for COVID-19 and tests for two residents have came back positive.
In an email from administrator Janna Sabourin to families of the residents, obtained by Cornwall Newswatch, the two residents at Woodland Villa were asymptomatic as of Friday afternoon, similar to the eight resident cases at Pinecrest Nursing Home in Plantagenet. “We are hopeful this situation does not change,” Sabourin writes.
The families of the two residents have been contacted individually, the email states.
There were 238 tests conducted in the home. All of the other tests on residents came back negative. The home is waiting on a “small amount” of results for some of its staff but, so far, the rest have come back negative as well.
Woodland Villa is run by OMNI Health Care. According to its website, the facility has 111 beds in private, semi-private and basic rooms.
All residents are being isolated in their rooms, “appropriate precautions” are being taken with the positive residents, staff are disinfecting meal carts between every use, and housekeeping and cleaning efforts have been enhanced, the email explains.
Sobourin says they are working closely with the Eastern Ontario Health Unit, the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Long Term Care to “carefully monitor and halt the spread of infection.”
The numbers were reflected in the Saturday afternoon update by the EOHU where the number of SD&G cases jumped from 18 to 20 and the number of institutional cases went from 16 to 18 but there was no notice of a new outbreak at a home.
Ontario Ministry of Health guidelines dictate that an outbreak is declared as soon as there is one positive case of novel coronavirus in a long term care home involving either a resident or a staff member.
As of Saturday afternoon, the health unit hadn’t publicly acknowledged the outbreak in Long Sault. Other Eastern Ontario health units, like the Leeds, Grenville and Lanark District Health Unit, issue news releases as soon as there’s an outbreak declared at a long term care home.