Ontario reports 783 new coronavirus cases, 5 more deaths

Ontario is reporting 783 new cases of coronavirus on Thursday, bringing the provincial total to 62,196.

Thursday’s case count is a slight increase from Wednesday which saw 731 new infections and Tuesday’s with 746.

According to Thursday’s provincial report, 239 new cases were recorded in Toronto, 136 in Peel Region, 127 in York Region, 89 in Ottawa, 40 in Durham Region and 28 in Halton Region. All other public health units in Ontario reported under 25 new cases.

Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott said nearly 40,000 tests were processed in the last 24 hours. The government has said it’s looking at increasing testing capacity to 50,000 tests a day by mid-October.

However, there is currently a backlog of 36,314 tests that need results.

A total of 4,534,334 tests have been completed since the pandemic began.

Here is a breakdown of the total cases in Ontario by gender and age:

• 29,732 people are male — an increase of 402 cases.
• 32,047 people are female — an increase of 397 cases.
• 5,888 people are 19 and under — an increase of 128 cases.
• 22,271 people are 20 to 39 — an increase of 261 cases.
• 17,414 people are 40 to 59 — an increase of 247 cases.
• 9,614 people are 60 to 79 — an increase of 108 cases.
• 6,749 people are 80 and over — an increase of 30 cases.

The province notes that not all cases have a reported age or gender.

The province also notes that the number of cases publicly reported each day may not align with case counts reported by the local public health unit on a given day. Local public health units report when they were first notified of a case, which can be updated and changed as information becomes available.

The death toll in the province has risen to 3,022 as five new deaths were reported.

Meanwhile, 53,291 Ontarians have recovered from COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, which is 85 per cent of known cases. Resolved cases increased by 779 from the previous day.

Ontario has 253  people hospitalized due to COVID-19 (up by 22 from the previous day), with 62 patients in an intensive care unit (down by two) and 31 patients in ICUs on a ventilator (down by four). All hospitalizations have, overall, increased over the last several weeks.

The newly reported numbers for Thursday’s report are valid as of 2 p.m. Wednesday for Toronto, Ottawa and Middlesex-London public health units, and 4 p.m. Wednesday for the rest of the province.

Ontario child care centres and schools

Meanwhile, government figures show there have been a total of 1,045 school-related COVID-19 cases in Ontario — 635 among students and 184 among staff (326 individuals were not identified). This is an increase of 109 more cases from the previous day.

In the last 14 days, the province indicates there are 399 cases reported among students and 99 cases among staff (188 individuals were not identified) — totaling 645 cases.

The COVID-19 cases are currently from 451 out of 4,828 schools in the province.

Five schools in Ontario are currently closed as a result of positive cases, the government indicated.

There have been a total of 281 confirmed cases within child care centres and homes — an increase of 20 since the previous day (15 new child cases and five new staff cases).

Numbers for cases in schools and child care centres is updated weekdays only, at 10:30 a.m.

Ontario long-term care homes

According to the Ministry of Long-Term Care, there have been 1,897 deaths reported among residents and patients in long-term care homes across Ontario, an increase of one death in 24 hours. Eight health-care workers and staff in long-term care homes have died.

There are 71 current outbreaks in homes, an increase of six.

The ministry also indicated there are currently 159 active cases among long-term care residents and 199 active cases among staff — up by 17 and 10 cases respectively in the last day.