Today Health and Seniors Care Minister Audrey Gordon announced that the province is making changes to the self-isolation public health orders currently in place in order to adapt to the rise of availability of rapid antigen tests as well as helping address the surge in COVID-19 case by the Omicron Variant.

The changes will include:

• Requiring all people who have tested positive for COVID-19 to isolate including those who completed a rapid antigen test.
• Changing isolation requirements to five days from 10 days since the date of the test for fully vaccinated people who are not showing symptoms.
• Changing isolation requirements to five days from 10 days since the date symptoms started appearing or the date of the test, whichever is later, for fully vaccinated people as long as their symptoms are improving, and they do not have a fever.
• Requiring individuals who have only isolated for five days due to the changes above to wear a medical-grade mask while in a public setting for the five days immediately following their self-isolation.
• Requiring isolation for people who have tested positive who are not fully vaccinated for 10 days after the date of their test if their symptoms are improving, and they do not have a fever.

This public health order will come into effect at 12:01 am Saturday January 1, 2022.

Public Health officials also recommend that people who are leaving isolation avoid all non-essential visits to high-risk settings or non-essential contact with high-risk individuals for an extra five days after isolation is complete.

The above orders also continue to include the following from the previous orders:

• Requiring close contacts who are not exempt from self-isolation requirements to self-isolate for 10 days.
• Requiring people to provide information about locations where people have been in the previous 10 days for contact tracing purposes as required.

Public Health officials also recommend that all household close contacts who are exempt from self-isolation while the case is isolating be extra cautious and avoid all non-essential visits to high-risk settings or non-essential contact with high-risk individuals.

For all information on COVID-19 in the province click here.