COVID-19 is a new virus to everybody around the globe. Everyone is susceptible because none of us has had a chance to build our immune system up to it. Without a vaccine and without public health measures to reduce exposure, there is a high probability that the vast majority of NWT residents could acquire COVID-19 in the coming months and years. However, with public health measures that we have in place, it's unlikely that all of the NWT's population will get COVID at the same time or in the same season. That is why it's so important that we stay the course and follow the public health advice and orders that are in place so that we can continue to contain the spread of COVID-19 and keep the curve flat.

The NWT has not experienced any community transmission, so we don't have the data to be able to model how COVID-19 might behave in the Northwest Territories if we did have community transmission, so our modelling efforts are being informed by the experience of places where community transmission has occurred, including those that are similar to the Northwest Territories, like northern regions in other provinces. This will help us get a more realistic idea of how the outbreak might spread.

What we know from other regions that are affected is approximately 80 percent of infections are mild enough to be managed at home; it's about 15 percent who are hospitalized; 5 percent require ICU; and approximately 1 percent die. In the Northwest Territories, this could translate to 450 deaths from COVID-19, so, in order to delay the spread of COVID-19 as much as possible, we put public health measures in place early, before there was any evidence of community transmission, and this has helped us contain the spread of the virus.