Ontario report 745 cases but say the sharp drop was caused by “data issues”.
The Ministry of Health said the total count of new cases of COVID-19 was unreliable because the migration of Toronto Public Health (TPH) to the data tracking system of the province resulted in a negative number of new infections being reported by the unit. Case counts were also affected in a number of other regions, the ministry said, although it did not identify the health units by name or detail the magnitude of the impacts on today’s overall total.
During the summer of 2020, most of the 34 public health units in Ontario switched over to the province’s centralized data system. However, up until now, Toronto had relied on its own internal program to track and trace infections with COVID-19. The ministry said TPH migration could result in “fluctuations in case numbers” for the next few days. The unreliability of the official number of the province today means it would be imprudent at this point to draw conclusions about broader COVID-19 trends in Ontario.
The province, meanwhile, reported the deaths of 14 more individuals with the disease, pushing the toll to 6,238. To date, Ontario has seen 109 instances of the first COVID-19 variant found in the United Kingdom. Variant and one of the South African variants that have emerged. Since the last daily update, another 2,715 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered. So far in Ontario, a total of 344,615 doses have been administered.
