28.05.2021

Effects of the nation­wide hybrid strat­e­gy on the Soite area’s coro­na rec­om­men­da­tions — 3 new infections

Cen­tral Ostrobothnia’s region­al COVID-19 author­i­ty task group gath­ered on Fri­day May 28th 2021 for an addi­tion­al meet­ing to eval­u­ate the region­al sit­u­a­tion­al pic­ture as well as the region­al rec­om­men­da­tions espe­cial­ly when tak­ing into account the nation­al hybrid strat­e­gy. The region­al rec­om­men­da­tions will change start­ing June 2nd 2021 so that the rec­om­men­da­tion for meet­ings indoors is max. 10 peo­ple and out­doors max. 20 peo­ple. Three new cas­es of coro­n­avirus infec­tion have been con­firmed in Soite’s area.

The num­ber of coro­n­avirus infec­tions in Soite’s area has begun to decrease, but the sit­u­a­tion is still seri­ous. The inci­dence of infec­tions dur­ing 14 days is cur­rent­ly 182/100.000 res­i­dents in the entire Soite area. The major­i­ty of the new infec­tions have been con­firmed in peo­ple who were already in quar­an­tine, but infec­tions are still also being con­firmed among peo­ple who are not in quar­an­tine. The coro­n­avirus infec­tions have been traced with an 80 per­cent cer­tain­ty. Two COVID-19 patients are cur­rent­ly being treat­ed at Cen­tral Ostrobothnia’s cen­tral hospital.

1.2% of the coro­n­avirus tests are pos­i­tive. In the analy­sis of coro­n­avirus sam­ples it has been con­firmed that the most recent sam­ple results are of the Indi­an vari­ant and it is very like­ly that all infec­tions asso­ci­at­ed with the exten­sive chain of infec­tions are caused by the Indi­an vari­ant of the coro­n­avirus. This vari­ant is high­ly con­ta­gious, and thus it is very impor­tant that every­one care­ful­ly fol­lows the rec­om­men­da­tions regard­ing social gath­er­ings and the hygiene rec­om­men­da­tions for pre­ven­tion of the spread of coro­n­avirus infections.

On 27th of May 2021 the Finnish gov­ern­ment adopt­ed a res­o­lu­tion to update the hybrid strat­e­gy. The aim of the updat­ed action plan is to min­i­mize and con­trol the spread of coro­n­avirus in Fin­land until the vac­ci­na­tion cov­er­age is suf­fi­cient and the risk of the epi­dem­ic accel­er­at­ing again has been sig­nif­i­cant­ly reduced. Cen­tral Ostrobothnia’s region­al COVID-19 author­i­ty task group gath­ered to eval­u­ate Soite’s region­al rec­om­men­da­tions, espe­cial­ly tak­ing into account the nation­al hybrid strat­e­gy, and issued guide­lines for the fol­low­ing changes and updates to the rec­om­men­da­tions, effec­tive as of June 2nd 2021:

• the recommendation for gatherings indoors is max 10 people
• the recommendation for gatherings outdoors is max 20 people
• hobby activities: series games can be played without an audience if regional restrictions on social gatherings and hygiene guidelines are followed

The new rec­om­men­da­tions remain in effect from June 2nd until 15th of June 2021. The region­al rec­om­men­da­tions remain oth­er­wise unchanged. The Region­al State Admin­is­tra­tive Agency will make its deci­sion regard­ing the restric­tions on gath­er­ings in the near future. All region­al reg­u­la­tions and rec­om­men­da­tions regard­ing the coro­n­avirus epi­dem­ic with­in Soite’s area are list­ed on Soite’s coro­na web­site: https://korona.soite.fi/en/recommendations/. Rec­om­men­da­tions and restric­tions are need­ed to curb the spread of the epi­dem­ic, to guar­an­tee that health care ser­vices remain func­tion­al and, above all, to keep peo­ple healthy.

The region­al COVID-19 author­i­ty task group has its next reg­u­lar meet­ing on Wednes­day June 2nd 2021.

The sit­u­a­tion today

Three new cas­es of coro­n­avirus infec­tion have been con­firmed in Soite’s area. Two of the cas­es are relat­ed to the exten­sive chain of infec­tions in the region and the infect­ed per­sons were already in quar­an­tine since before the infec­tions were con­firmed. One of the new infec­tions was con­firmed at the bor­der control.

The region­al sit­u­a­tion­al pic­ture can be found at Soite’s coro­na web­site: https://korona.soite.fi/en/corona-virus-info/  

We urge every­one who has even mild symp­toms indica­tive of coro­n­avirus to quick­ly seek out coro­n­avirus test­ing. You should not go out­side your home even if you have only mild symptoms!