There were 997 new COVID-19 cases and two new deaths from the virus reported today in B.C.

The new cases included 91 in Interior Health. There were also 465 new cases in Fraser Health, 356 in Vancouver Coastal Health, 67 in Island Health and 18 in Northern Health.

Right now, there are 8,728 active cases of COVID-19 in B.C. and a record-high 14,602 people are isolating after being exposed to the virus. There are 330 people in hospital with the virus and now 105 in intensive care. The number of ICU patients from the virus is currently a record.

It’s unclear how many of today’s new cases are linked to more-contagious variants of concern, as there has been no sequencing for variant cases done today. As of yesterday, there were 266 active variant cases out of 3,766 total variant cases.

Experts say B.C. is under-reporting the number of COVID-19 cases that are variants of concern.

The province only reports variant cases after confirming them through whole-genome sequencing.

UBC professor Sarah Otto says B.C. doesn’t have the capacity to sequence every presumptive variant picked up during the initial P-C-R test.

She says B.C. should report that number right away, like Ontario does.

“If a patient comes into the hospital and you know it’s a variant, then you already know the person is at basically double the risk. And so doctors should be treating the cases more cautiously. As well, if you just got it and you realize you’re carrying a variant, then people might be just that much more cautious.”

Provincial health officer Doctor Bonnie Henry says variants of concern only represent about three per cent of the province’s active cases, but Otto says she believes about 50 per cent of the province’s cases are these more transmissible variants.

Meanwhile, 946,096 vaccine doses have been administered in B.C., to more than 858,000 people.

In Kamloops, Interior Health says a one-day high of 1,240 people were vaccinated yesterday, between the two clinics at the Tournament Capital Centre and the McArthur Island Events Centre. IH is blaming the high demand for lineups outside of those clinics that were more than an hour long, but also says the lines yesterday were a one-off.

As of today, anyone in B.C. born in 1951 or earlier, any Indigenous residents born in 2003 and earlier, and anyone 16 and older who is considered “clinically extremely vulnerable” is able to book a vaccine appointment.

 – with a file from The Canadian Press