NOTE: This story was updated with new information Feb. 26.
After a quiet week for New Westminster Secondary School, the city's only high school is back on the COVID-19 exposures list two days running this week.
An exposure occurred at the high school on Feb. 18, according to the Fraser Health school exposures website. As of Friday morning (Feb. 26), a Feb. 19 exposure has also been added.
It follows on the heels of a series of exposures earlier in the month, when families received multiple notices regarding exposures on Feb. 1, 3, 4, 5 and 8.
January had been uneventful at the high school, with one exposure reported on Jan. 28 following the longest stretch in the school district without an exposure since October.
Exposure numbers in schools across Fraser Health (which covers the territory from Burnaby to Boston Bar) have been increasing in February, with concerns now focused on B.1.1.7 variant cases connected to seven schools in Surrey and North Delta.
So far, however, no variant cases have been reported in connection with New Westminster schools, and the number of school exposures remains relatively low in the district since winter break. Two district elementary schools – Connaught Heights and Lord Kelvin – have yet to see exposures at all this school year.
COVID-19 SCHOOL EXPOSURES IN NEW WESTMINSTER IN 2021
- Glenbrook Middle School: Jan. 4, Feb. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12
- Home Learners Program: Jan. 5
- Queensborough Middle School: Jan. 11
- Herbert Spencer Elementary: Jan. 25
- Fraser River Middle School: Jan. 27, 28 and 29
- New Westminster Secondary School: Jan. 28, Feb. 1, 3, 4, 5, 8, 18
- Richard McBride Elementary School: Feb. 10, 11, 12
Follow Julie MacLellan on Twitter @juliemaclellan.
Email Julie, jmaclellan@newwestrecord.ca.
