It is another weekly record in the Kamloops local health area when it comes to weekly COVID-19 cases.

New data from the BC Centre for Disease Control shows there were 270 cases during the week of Sept. 5 and Sept. 11, in the area which includes not only the City of Kamloops but also Sun Peaks, Chase, Barriere, Little Fort, Savona, Tobiano and Logan Lake.

That breaks the old record of 249 cases set in each of the previous two weeks, Aug. 29 to Sept. 4 and Aug. 22 to Aug. 28.

This latest data means there is still an average daily rate of more than 20 COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people in the Kamloops area.

Elsewhere, there were 360 cases in the Kelowna area (down from 478), 165 cases in Vernon (down from 169), 104 cases in Salmon Arm (up from 76), 11 cases in Merritt (down from 21), and four cases in North Thompson (up from three).

The Cariboo/Chilcotin saw another increase to 95 new cases (up from 77) while the South Cariboo also was up slightly to 23 new cases (up from 19). There were another nine cases in 100 Mile House (up from seven), and five in Lillooet (unchanged).

For the fourth straight week, every single local health area in the Interior reported at least one new COVID-19 case, with a majority again in the Kootenays and in the Okanagan.

These rising case counts have led to the return of the masks indoors and the BC Vaccine Card, which got underway on Monday, Sept. 13.

As of Wednesday, there were 288 people in hospital with COVID, with 137 of those people in intensive care. In Interior Health, there are 53 people in hospital with the virus, with 47 of those people in the ICU.

Across B.C., only Vancouver Island West, parts of the Central Coast, and Haida Gwaii reported no new cases last week.

A full map of last week’s COVID-19 case count by locations can be found here.