Ontario recorded 23 net new COVID-19 deaths, including one long-term care worker, as hospitalizations dropped and test positivity dropped to a multi-month low on Thursday.
According to the Ministry of Health, 20 of the deaths happened within the last 30 days, and three happened before that.
Three of the victims were long-term care residents, while the fourth was a long-term care facility employee.
Since the epidemic began, 11 long-term care health workers have died of COVID-19 in Ontario, according to the province.
Public Health Ontario said one of the new deaths involved someone between the ages of 20 and 39.
There have been 102 COVID-19 deaths confirmed in the past seven days and 488 in the past 30 days.
Ontario is aware of 13,122 COVID-19 deaths since the pandemic began in March 2020.
UHN infection prevention specialist Dr. Susy Hota said Thursday all reliable indicators still suggest the picture is improving in most of the province.
“It appears that things have stabilized somewhat at least and continuing to decrease in wastewater surveillance in most parts of the province,” she told CP24. “But in the North we are actually seeing increasing rates of COVID-19.”
The Ontario COVID-19 Science Advisory Table, citing wastewater surveillance data, suggests viral prevalence is stable or declining in all areas of the province except for the north.
In hospitals, the Ministry of Health says there were 1,207 COVID-positive patients in hospital on Thursday, down from 1,248 yesterday and 1,451 one week ago.
Of those, 168 were in intensive care, up three from yesterday but down seven from one week ago.
Seventy-one patients were breathing with the help of a ventilator, down five from yesterday and four from one week ago.
Of the 1,565 cases confirmed through PCR testing on Thursday, the Ministry of Health says 172 involved partially vaccinated or unvaccinated people, 278 involved people with two doses of vaccine, 1,050 involved people with three or four doses of vaccine and 65 involved people whose vaccination status was not known.
Source_ cp24.com
