A 41-person medical team from the Canadian Armed Forces is in Mathias Colomb Cree Nation, also known as Pukatawagan, assisting in COVID-19 vaccinations, conducting wellness checks and delivering food.
The community, located about 800 kilometres north of Winnipeg, has over 200 active cases in their community of roughly 3,000 people. There are over 300 total cases of COVID-19 within Mathias Colomb.
Indigenous Services Canada said in a statement to APTN News that over 60 personnel from various organizations are assisting the community.
“Along with employees of Indigenous Services Canada, over 60 personnel have been deployed to Mathias Colomb Cree Nation from the Canadian Armed Forces, the Canadian Red Cross, the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs’ Ambassadors Program, the Manitoba First Nation Pandemic Response and Coordination Team, and public health professionals from the provincial government and regional health authorities,” the statement said.
While members are being vaccinated, officials said it simply is not enough to stop the spread. The community is on lockdown to prevent cases from spreading.
Mathias Colomb Chief Lorna Bighetty is currently in isolation and acting Chief Shirley Castel said there are limited options for members to leave their homes.
“Any department that provides a service to our community, those ones are allowed to go to work and then to go home after they finish their work. And then the second one is they allow the patients, medical attention, any community member needs medical attention they need to phone the nursing station to talk to a nurse and then the medical van will be there to pick you up,” Castel said in a community update.
She added that Pukatawagan is using colour-coded signs on the windows of homes to communicate anything they might need while the lockdown is occurring.
“Green is all is ok, and then there’s those yellow and red signs. It states on your signs of what those colours are for. If you could put them on the window. Red is for urgent so you know if you put that on the window and a monitor can be dispatched to the nursing station that you are in need of medical attention.”
There are currently 62 people isolating outside of the community while 13 are isolating within Mathias Colomb in alternative isolation accommodations.
Lloyd Daniels lives in the community and says the lockdown has affected community spirits, but they will keep fighting.
“We just do the best we can to help one another in this community. But it is very emotional, and it does make you cry and it makes you think, you know your feelings and your thinking come into play. But it can be heavy at times but we always, I’m very glad that we always pick up one another from there,” he said.
Mathias Colomb is also under a short-term drinking water advisory and residents must boil their water.
“We have a boil water control that’s been posted about a year and it’s been off and on going. Throughout the community, there is water issues. Some are receiving water properly, adequately. But in the same time, we have those other parts of the community that still have service regarding transportation of sewage and water into intakes, but that needs to be resolved as well,” Daniels added.
The test positivity rate in the community is over 45 per cent and that has doctor Marcia Anderson concerned.
“I just really want to strongly encourage people as your community leaders, public health team has been saying, to stay at home except for those essential service providers or to get essential services. Because when we stay home, that’s how we lower the number of close contacts we are exposed to that either might pass on the illness to us or that we might pass on the illness too,” Anderson said in the same community update as Castel.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Friday afternoon that Canadian Armed Forces personnel will be sent to help with COVID-19 vaccinations in up to 23 northern Manitoba First Nations.
