COVID update Friday: 109 new cases, vaccine rate up to 75%

British Columbia is ending the work week with 109 new COVID-19 cases, down slightly from the 120 on Thursday.

Of the new cases, 26 are in Interior Health with 13 in Vancouver Coastal Health, 65 in Fraser Health, five in Northern Health and no new cases in the Island Health region.

There are currently 1,389 active cases of COVID-19 with 128 people hospitalized and 48 in intensive care.

There has been one new death, for a total of 1,740 in B.C.

As of today, 76.7 per cent of all adults in B.C. and 75.1 per cent of those 12 and older have now received their first dose of a COVID vaccine.

A total of 4,296,151 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca vaccines have been administered, 823,371 of which are second doses.

Provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry and Health Minister Adrian Dix are encouraging residents to book their second vaccine dose.

“Our supply varies week by week. As a result, while the teams at our mass vaccine clinics will do their best to provide the same mRNA vaccine (Pfizer or Moderna) for both doses, this may not always be possible. You may be offered the other mRNA vaccine instead.

“Interchangeability, having a different mRNA vaccine for your second dose, does not impact effectiveness or safety. All of our vaccines are safe and highly effective and that is the case whether you have the same or different vaccine for your second dose,” said Dix and Henry in a statement

Dix and Henry say people can make Father’s Day even more special, by getting immunized.

“This weekend, for Father’s Day, let’s do our part and honour our fathers by protecting them with our own COVID-19 vaccine.”