While Interior Health says it will test all new patients at Royal Inland Hospital for COVID-19, it will not be testing staff at the hospital before each shift.

Chief Medical Health Officer, Dr. Albert de Villiers says it not practical or feasible to test staff all the time.

“You can honestly be tested today and then tomorrow you can turn positive because you were exposed in the community somewhere, so if you test positive, we can do something about it, but if you test negative, it doesn’t necessarily show that you won’t have the disease tomorrow,” he said.

de Villiers though noted its not to say staff are not regularly tested for COVID-19 especially when there are outbreaks like the one at the hospital right now.

“In an outbreak situation like this, the same as we do in long term care, we do test people multiple times. Maybe once a week or once every second week depending on what is happening, but that is specific to the outbreak unit,” he said. “We do have a symptom check that the staff do every day before they come into work, and also checking their symptoms through the day to make sure if they develop a fever or anything during the day, they immediately go home.”

“So we do have that level of checks in place, and if people come to the hospital in the morning, they’re asked symptom questions as well.”

The outbreak at Royal Inland Hospital remains at 71 cases among 46 staff and 25 patients. It is also currently contained to surgical unit 6 South – where it broke out – and the hospital’s COVID ward, 6 North.