Ottawa reports 5 new COVID-19 deaths, declining active case counts

Five more people in Ottawa died in the past day in connection with COVID-19, the local public health unit reported on Monday, as active case counts start to drop off slightly in the pandemic’s third wave.

Ottawa Public Health reported 190 new COVID-19 cases on Monday, following increases of 227 cases on Sunday and 254 cases on Saturday.

There have now been 495 deaths related to COVID-19 in Ottawa since the start of the pandemic.

The number of active coronavirus cases in the city was down to 2,682 as of Monday, compared with more than 3,000 at the tail end of last week.

There are now 108 Ottawa residents in hospital with COVID-19, 27 of whom are in the intensive care unit.

OPH’s statistics do not include people transferred to local health facilities from outside the city, but the health unit’s figures show 91 per cent of acute care beds and 71 per cent of ICU beds in Ottawa are currently occupied.

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A few other metrics in Ottawa’s efforts to curb the spread of COVID-19 are trending in the right direction.

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The city’s positivity rate for the past week is down to 10.5 per cent compared to highs of 11.7 per cent last week.

Ottawa’s estimated reproduction number, or the number of additional infections connected to the typical COVID-19 case, has plummeted in recent days. It now stands at 0.55 for the past week, with values lower than one suggest the spread of virus is slowing rather than speeding up.

There are now 37 COVID-19 outbreaks in Ottawa, compared with 50 roughly a week ago. Seventeen of these outbreaks are affecting workplaces in the city.