Ontario reports 847 new coronavirus cases, 10 more deaths

Ontario is reporting 847 new coronavirus cases on Wednesday, bringing the provincial total to 288,583.

Wednesday’s case count is lower than Tuesday’s which saw 904 new infections. On Monday, 964 new cases were recorded.

It is also the lowest case count since Feb. 2, when 745 new cases were reported but the government said that day was an underestimation due to data system migration. Prior to that, it is the lowest daily increase since the end of October.

According to Wednesday’s provincial report, 257 cases were recorded in Toronto, 170 in Peel Region, 131 in York Region and 53 in Ottawa.

All other local public health units reported fewer than 50 new cases in the provincial report.

The province also noted for Wednesday that due to ongoing “data quality checks and remediation” from Toronto Public Health’s migration to the provincial system, case counts may fluctuate.

The death toll in the province has risen to 6,729 as 10 more deaths were reported — the lowest single-day increase since Dec. 1 when seven deaths were reported.

Officials have included a section for confirmed variant cases and have listed 338 U.K. variant cases (B.1.1.7), six South African variant cases (B.1.351), and one Brazilian variant case (P.1) detected so far in the province.

Meanwhile, 270,869 Ontarians were reported to have recovered from COVID-19, which is 93 per cent of known cases. Resolved cases increased by 1,456 from the previous day.

There were more resolved cases on Wednesday than new cases.

Active cases in Ontario now stand at 10,985 — down from the previous day when it was 11,604, and down from last Wednesday at 13,270.

The seven-day average has now reached 1,002, down from yesterday at 1,035, and down from last week at 1,353 — showing a downward trend in new cases.

The government said 33,977 tests were processed in the last 24 hours. There is currently a backlog of 33,730 tests awaiting results. A total of 10,467,249 tests have been completed since the start of the pandemic.

Test positivity — the percentage of tests that come back positive — for Wednesday was three per cent, down from Tuesday when it was 3.6 per cent but up from a week ago at 2.5 per cent.

Ontario reported 719 people hospitalized with COVID-19 (down by 23 from the previous day) with 298 patients in intensive care units (up by six) and 211 patients in ICUs on a ventilator (up by ten).

As of 8 p.m. on Tuesday, the province has administered 489,484 COVID-19 vaccine doses, representing an increase of 9,107 in the last day. There are 195,366 people fully vaccinated with two doses. Both Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, the only vaccines currently approved in Canada, require two shots.

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

• 141,585 people are male — an increase of 479 cases.
• 145,486 people are female — an increase of 405 cases.
• 37,960 people are 19 and under — an increase of 134 cases.
• 105,525 people are 20 to 39 — an increase of 314 cases.
• 83,481 people are 40 to 59 — an increase of 255 cases.
• 41,694 people are 60 to 79 — an increase of 113 cases.
• 19,864 people are 80 and over — an increase of 33 cases.
• The province notes that not all cases have a reported age or gender.

Here is a breakdown of the total deaths related to COVID-19 by age:

• Deaths reported in ages 19 and under: 2
• Deaths reported in ages 20 to 39: 27
• Deaths reported in ages 40 to 59: 267
• Deaths reported in ages 60 to 79: 1,832
• Deaths reported in ages 80 and older: 4,600
• The province notes there may be a reporting delay for deaths and data corrections or updates can result in death records being removed.

Cases, deaths and outbreaks in Ontario long-term care homes

According to the Ministry of Long-Term Care, there have been 3,728 deaths reported among residents and patients in long-term care homes across Ontario which is an increase of 11 deaths. A discrepancy in long-term care home deaths by the ministry and the province’s daily death count can be the result of delays in reporting or when the data is pulled.

Eleven virus-related deaths in total have been reported among staff.

There are 155 current outbreaks in homes, which is a decrease of 15 from the previous day.

The ministry also indicated there are currently 210 active cases among long-term care residents and 333 active cases among staff — down by 59 cases and down by 58 cases, respectively, in the last day.