The current provincial COVID-19 measures will continue to be in place for at least the next two weeks.

Premier Jason Kenney announced on Thursday they’re keeping these restrictions in place until at least January 21 to help active totals drop across Alberta.

These measures include restricting social gatherings, making masks mandatory, capping occupancy at retail stores, and more.

“These mandatory measures are in place to slow the spread of COVID-19 and we are not yet in a position to remove or reduce them,” added Dr. Deena Hinshaw, Alberta’s Chief Medical Officer of Health.

“Keeping these measures in place means we are again asking Albertans to make sacrifices – but they are necessary to protect our province.”

The province is also moving forward with returning to in-school teaching as of Monday, January 11. Students across the province have been taking their classes online throughout the week.

Daily COVID-19 Update

Fort McMurray is once again seeing its active total of COVID-19 cases take a steep rise.

Dr. Hinshaw also announced on Thursday 968 new cases across the province.

This raises the provincial total to 108,469 with 13,298 currently active. There are also 871 Albertans in the hospital for the virus, 139 of which are in ICUs.

Locally, Fort McMurray added 24 new cases and seven additional recoveries which raises the active total to 266.

The rural areas added one new case and one recovery which keeps the total of active cases at seven, while two people continue to have the virus in Wood Buffalo National Park.

In total, 1,329 individuals across the RMWB – 1,207 in Fort McMurray, 117 in the rural areas, and five in Wood Buffalo National Park – have recovered.

They are among the 93,954 who’ve recovered across the province. This represents over 86 per cent of reported cases.

There were also 24 new deaths from COVID-19 in Alberta over the past 24 hours – raising the total to 1,217.

To date, three individuals in Fort McMurray have died as a result of the virus.