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Confirmed case of COVID-19 linked to Macaulay Elementary in Esquimalt

A COVID-19 exposure has been reported at Ecole Macaulay Elementary School, the second in the Greater Victoria School District since the pandemic began.
Coronavirus

A COVID-19 exposure has been reported at Ecole Macaulay Elementary School, the second in the Greater Victoria School District since the pandemic began.

An exposure is when one person with a confirmed case of COVID-19 attends a school — in this case, on Jan. 20, 21 and 22. Island Health is conducting contact tracing and will inform people directly if they might have been exposed.

A previous COVID-19 exposure in the Greater Victoria School District was reported in November at Sir James Douglas Elementary, where an entire class was asked to self-isolate.

School district superintendent Shelley Green said it is “very, very good” to have just two schools affected in a district of 44 schools and about 20,000 students — the Island’s largest.

“We are doing well,” she said. “I think we’re lucky being on the Island and people in this community certainly are paying close attention to it.”

Other recent COVID-19 exposures at Island schools include one reported Sunday at Parksville’s PASS-Woodwinds Alternate School and another reported last Friday at Shawnigan Lake School. A notice of an exposure at Colwood’s Royal Bay Secondary was issued Jan. 18.

Macaulay Parent Advisory Council president Stephanie Hazlitt said a notice about the Macaulay exposure went out Tuesday night, but most people associated with the school are “reasonably well-prepared,” since there have been other exposures at Island schools. “So I think that has perhaps mentally prepared the community.”

Hazlitt has one child at the school, which is home to about 490 students.

“I feel like the process that has been put in place by our health authorities, working with the provincial health officer has been consistent. I’m seeing that process that I had heard about.”

jbell@timescolonist.com