F.W. Begley Public School has 26 confirmed cases of COVID-19: GECDSB

According to numbers from the public school board, Frank W. Begley Public School currently has the dubious honours ofthe largest school outbreak in Ontario.

The school's 26 cases, according to the Greater Essex County District School Board, is significantly larger than the largest outbreak listed on the provincial school outbreak website:it says Pickering High School, in Ajax, has 18 confirmed cases.

It is not clear when those numbers were last updated. The site lists Frank W. Begleywith just 2 staff cases.

More than 400 students and staff from Frank W. Begleyare currently in isolation after the health unit dismissed students and staff on Nov. 17.

Sharon Pyke,superintendent of education for the school board, said she wasnotifiedSaturday morningby the public health unitthat "we had an additional three adults andan additional 20 students that were confirmed with COVID" at the school.

She says the board has made sure that all students in the school are well equipped for online learning which starts Monday.

"Online learning is not to be confused with the online learning school. We are trying to make sure that our students remain on the timetable that's familiar," she said. "They will be going to school the regular time that they would have gone to school, except they're doing it online, they'll be still having the same teachers ... and still having the same schedule."

Deep clean the school

Also happening on Monday is a scheduled cleaning of the entire building, Pyke said.

"So people can be rest assured that in addition to the regular cleaning that they've done and the enhanced cleaning that they've been doing due to COVID, that we are doing a full deep cleaning of the buildings so that when students come back, they can be reassured that everything has been cleaned."

She said theschool board will meetMonday to take a look at infectionnumbers and patterns of spread to discussnext steps when it comes to outbreak and what that looks like in areaschools.

Frank W. Begley isone of two schools in the regionthathave fully closed due to COVID-19 outbreak.

Students and staff at WJ Langlois Catholic Elementary School were dismissedFriday by the Windsor-Essex County Health Unit (WECHU). The school will remain closed for 14 days.

New cases reported

The health unitreported 42 new cases of COVID-19 Sunday.

There are 352active cases in the region. Of these, 12are in the hospital and 216 are self-isolating.

Four long-term care and retirement homes are in outbreak, including:

• Riverside Place in Windsor with one resident case.
• Berkshire Care Center in Windsor with one staff case.
• Lifetimes on Riverside in Windsor with five resident cases and four staff cases.
• Iler Lodge in Essex with 17 resident cases and one staff case.

A community outbreak at a University of Windsor residence is still active.As well, oneagriculture workplace in Leamington remains in outbreak.

Windsor-Essex has now had 3,290confirmed cases of COVID-19and 77deaths.

The Windsor-Essex region has been moved into the province's orange COVID-19 category, with new restrictions coming into effect Monday.