“I just want to clarify, we are entering a fifth Omicron wave. There should be no illusions of that. I was watching case numbers every day over the Christmas long weekend.”

Those were the words of Saskatchewan Chief Medical Health Officer Dr. Saqib Shahab as the provincial government updated the COVID-19 situation on Thursday.

The province announced 589 new cases on Thursday as the Omicron variant begins to take hold in Saskatchewan.

Shahab said the variant is much more contagious compared to the other variants of concern and they are seeing cases mostly in younger people.

“Right now, most of the Omicron cases in Saskatchewan and throughout Canada are in the 20 to 39 year age group,” Shahab said.

“We're not seeing hospitalizations, but obviously as it impacts children under five or people who are older than 60, we will be watching very closely and the week of Jan. 10, hopefully we will have a detailed report.”

Premier Scott Moe and Health Minister Paul Merriman also met with reporters, saying that they are using hospitalizations and ICU admissions as the benchmark for public health measures and, currently, while Omicron cases are on the rise, hospitalizations are not, so no new public health measures will be enacted at this time.

Merriman said the fact Saskatchewan has the most rapid tests available compared to all the other provinces in Canada and the highest uptake in booster shots as the reasons why Saskatchewan is in a good position to get through the Omicron wave.

“I can guarantee you that Quebec does not have 90 million tests out there, rapid tests that they can distribute to their population. We're leading in boosters,” Merriman said.

“Those are the two key indicators that are going to help us with Omicron is our booster shots and our rapid tests, which we have 12 million in our province, 11 million distributed out there.”

Moe added that even the provinces that have initiated more public health measures are still not stopping the spread of Omicron.

“Our numbers are going to increase in the days ahead. Every other province in Canada has hit record numbers over the course of the last number of weeks, and we should expect that at some point early in the new year, we're likely going to hit record numbers here in Saskatchewan as well,” the Premier said.

The province did announce that those vaccinated that are asymptomatic who test positive using an antigen rapid test will no longer need a PCR confirmation test, but will have to self-isolate as if you have COVID-19.

Meanwhile, the self-isolation time for those vaccinated have been reduced from 10 days to five. Self-isolation time for those unvaccinated remains at 10 days.

The opposition NDP called the announcements on Thursday a step backwards when it comes to stopping the spread of the Omicron variant.

“We're the only province with no capacity limits. We're vulnerable because we have the lowest vaccination rates in the country. And what makes us so special is that the premier believes that our people won't be impacted in the same way as other provinces,” questioned NDP Health Critic Vicki Mowatt.

Opposition leader Ryan Meili said the antigen rapid tests and booster shots are good tools in the fight against COVID-19, but more needs to be done.

“Those are two tools in the toolbox. You don't say ‘oh, we've got a couple here. We're not going to look at any others.’ We're the only place in the entire country that has put in zero new public health measures,” Meili said.

Meili added it was notable that Moe and Merriman never mentioned the fact that only 70 percent of the population in the province is vaccinated, one of the lowest rates in Canada.