Ottawa Public Health says two more people have died as a result of novel coronavirus in the city, bringing the region’s death toll up to nine as of Thursday.
Between Wednesday and Thursday, the public health unit also identified 29 new cases, with the region’s total number of COVID-19 patients reaching 458.
Twelve people are currently in an intensive care unit due to the virus, with 18 others being treated in hospital.
Just under a third of all cases, 143, have been resolved.
Nevertheless, according to Ottawa Public Health’s website, lab-confirmed tests show only a small snapshot of the city’s COVID-19 cases.
“Within the entire Ottawa population, a large fraction of people are infected with the COVID-19 virus.”
“Most of these people do not know they are infected, because only a fraction of infected people show symptoms,” the public health’s website said.
Among those who are symptomatic, Ottawa Public Health says only a fraction of those people are actually tested for the virus.
Ottawa Public Health is currently using modelling from Ashleigh Tuite, David Fisman, and Amy Greer, from the University of Toronto and University of Guelph, to estimate where numbers will be in Ottawa in the coming weeks.
According to this modelling, Ottawa COVID-19 cases will begin to stabilize by mid-April, and new cases will hopefully cease to be detected by the beginning of May.