The London region’s daily COVID-19 caseload surged back about 100 on the same day the London Health Sciences Centre reported an all-time high number of patients with the virus in its care.
The Middlesex London Health Unit logged 113 new infections on Wednesday, a jump from the 72 cases reported on Tuesday. It is the first time in four days the area has seen a triple-digit single-day case increase.
Since the pandemic began there have been a total of 10,811 cases in London and Middlesex County.
The death toll rose by one to 203. The latest person to die from the virus was a man in his 80s with no link to a long-term care or retirement home, the health unit said. The death is the third COVID-19 related one this month.
Hospitalizations in the area have reached a record high locally with 99 COVID-19 patients admitted to the London Health Sciences Centre. There are 47 COVID-19 patients listed in intensive care. Of the 99 in hospital with the virus, 35 were transferred to London from overwhelmed hospitals in other regions of the province – ten in acute care and 25 in intensive care. Ten hospital employees are positive for the virus.
There were 15 more cases involving variants of concern in London and Middlesex County, for a total of 1,646. Of those, 1,637 have been identified as the B.1.1.7 from the U.K., eight are the P.1. variant from Brazil, and one is the new B.1.617 strain from India. The health unit also noted 276 cases have tested positive for a mutation.
Active outbreaks remain at three area seniors’ facilities, one schools, two child care centres, and one Western University residence.
Resolved cases are up by 90 for a total of 9,702. There are now 906 active cases in the region.
The health unit said there have been more than 170,000 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine administered in the region since Tuesday. That comes as vaccine eligibility in the city and county is about to expand to include those aged 50 and older. As of Thursday, anyone born in 1971 or earlier and essential workers from group one of Ontario’s phase two vaccine rollout plan can begin booking appointments at the region’s mass immunization clinics online at www.covidvaccinelm.ca or by calling 226-289-3560 daily between 8 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. Essential workers from group one include elementary and secondary school employees, farmers, and enforcement officers.
Southwestern Public Health recorded 11 new COVID-19 cases on Wednesday. That is down from 12 new infections the previous day. The latest cases put Elgin and Oxford counties’ total up to 3,473. There were no additional COVID-19 related deaths reported in the region, leaving the death toll at 76. Resolved cases rose to 3,271. There are now 126 active cases locally. An outbreak at Caressant Care Nursing Home in Woodstock has grown with two more cases confirmed. There are now a total of five staff members and three residents who have tested positive for the virus.
Ontario has recorded its highest number of single-day COVID-19 deaths in nearly three months as new cases fell below 3,000 for a second straight day.
According to public health officials, there were 44 additional deaths related to the virus on Wednesday, the most reported in one day since the third wave started. The last time there were this many deaths over a 24 hour period in Ontario was February 19. The official death toll now sits at 8,187.
There were 2,941 new infections confirmed on Wednesday, up from Tuesday’s 2,791 cases. On a positive note, this is the first time in more than a month the province has had two consecutive days with fewer than 3,000 cases.
Regions with the highest new case counts continue to be Toronto with 924 and Peel with 565. That is followed by York Region with 254, Durham with 171 and Hamilton with 140.
Ontario’s total case count since the start of the pandemic now sits at 476,692.
The daily epidemiologic summary indicates Ontario found 2,862 more lab confirmed cases over the past 24 hours of the B.1.1.7. variant. There are now a total of 80,511 cases of that strain, which was first discovered in the U.K. Another 30 cases of the P.1. variant has been confirmed for a total of 1,001 and there were eight more cases of the B.1.351 variant for a total of 317 in Ontario. The province does not currently list how many cases involving the B.1.617 variant, originally found in India, have been identified in Ontario.
Hospitalizations in the province remain high with 2,075 COVID-19 positive patients admitted, down 92 from the previous day. Of those in hospital, there are 882 in intensive care and 620 on ventilators.
Resolved cases across the province are up to 432,109. That leaves 34,976 known active cases of the virus in Ontario, down from 38,853 a week ago.
In the last 24 hour period, 45,767 COVID-19 tests were processed, up from 33,740 on Tuesday. Ontario’s positivity rate has dropped to 6.6 per cent from 9.1 per cent.
The province has administered 5,599,723 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine as of Tuesday night. A total of 381,123 people in Ontario have received their second dose of the vaccine and are considered fully inoculated.