EDMONTON -- University of Alberta students who live at the school's residence were asked to leave Saturday as the COVID-19 threat continues to grow.
That day, the university confirmed one of its students had contracted coronavirus: someone who was on campus on March 11, before the U of A cancelled in-person classes.
The patient did not live in residence and is in self-isolation, but in an attempt to reduce the risk of more COVID-19 spread and since the school moved classes online, students were asked to go home.
"The campus has become very quiet," said Andrew Sharman with the University of Alberta. "I think with people moving to remote delivery, we've seen almost a ghost town."
U of A officials said there are about 2,000 international students living in residence and they're not able to head home, but those who can are urged to leave.
"We want to increase the distancing between people, and when you have over 5,000 students living in residence or three campuses, that's hard," Sharman said. "But if we can get it down to 2,000 or around that, it's much easier for us to spread them out across our residences."
All school buildings are now locked down and can only be accessed by staff and students.
With files from CTV News Edmonton's Joey Slattery
