The province is not planning to separate Winnipeg by district, but for a specific travel-related reason.

Winnipeg has the highest concentrated population in all of Manitoba and has its own health region. Unlike other areas of the province, Winnipeg's health region is not separated by several districts. The single separation in the Winnipeg Health Region is between Winnipeg and Churchill, which is not separated on the provincial COVID-19 tracker.

wpg covid map(Government of Manitoba)

"We have considered breaking down Winnipeg more put from a public health approach, it really does not add a whole bunch," Dr. Brent Roussin says.

While possible, Roussin says that it is not helpful for the province to separate Winnipeg due to how they report cases.

"When we report cases, we report from their place of residence. If we break down Winnipeg into four or five different areas, that is where the person lives."

Roussin says that there are complications regarding separating the city by districts as Winnipeggers tend to travel across the city.

"They might live in the north, work in the south, they might have family in the west. Breaking out where the cases live does not necessarily tell us much."

The Chief Public Health Offical says that while he can identify how many current cases across the province are travel-related, he did not have those numbers for Winnipeg at the time of the press conference. 

Roussin also says that 80 per cent of COVID-19 cases in Manitoba in the past five days are epi-linked.

While the province may not be planing to separate Winnipeg into districts, Roussin says they will continue to give information regarding potential exposures across the province.