Ontario Reports 748 New Coronavirus Cases, 4 More Deaths

Ontario is reporting a slight increase in the daily number of cases week-over-week with nearly 750 new infections confirmed in the past 24 hours.

The province recorded 748 new cases today, up from 591 on Wednesday and 711 a week ago.

The seven-day moving average of new cases continues to rise, reaching 692 today, from 597 a week ago.

Of the new cases confirmed today, 356 are unvaccinated people, 19 are partially vaccinated, 329 are fully immune and 44 are people with unknown vaccination status.

Unvaccinated people account for 48% of all cases, although they only make up about 20% of the population.

Speaking to CP24 on Thursday, Dr Isaac Bogoch, an infectious disease specialist at Toronto General Hospital, said that not only are those vaccinated less likely to be infected, but they are likely to pass it on to fewer people than an unvaccinated person.

“Both (vaccinated and unvaccinated) can certainly have the same viral load, the same viral levels, but in the vaccinated group, there is evidence that the viral load decreases much faster compared to the unvaccinated group,” a- he declared.

Despite an increase in transmission of COVID-19 in recent weeks, the number of intensive care admissions and deaths from the virus has remained relatively stable.

There are currently 137 COVID-19 patients in intensive care, according to the Department of Health, up from 129 a week ago.

Four more virus-related deaths were added to the provincial total today, bringing the death toll from COVID-19 in Ontario to 9,985.

With 33,932 tests processed in the past 24 hours, authorities are reporting a province-wide positivity rate of 2.6%, up from 2% a week ago.

Ontario’s number of known and active cases now stands at 5,552, up from 4,872 last Thursday.

The public health units with the most new cases today are Toronto (77), Windsor (77), Simcoe-Muskoka (55), Region of Peel (48), Ottawa (45), Region of York (43) and the South West (39).

This week, the province began rolling out its vaccination program for children aged 5 to 11, and the city of Toronto has opened appointments for children in this cohort at its five mass vaccination sites.

Bogoch said unsurprisingly that children in this age group are overrepresented in the number of daily cases because they are unvaccinated and spend hours a day indoors near each other at school.

“We have seen the data from vaccine trials and we know that these vaccines have tremendous effectiveness in preventing children from getting this infection,” he said.

“I really think it’s going to have a pretty big impact not only on schools, but also hopefully ripple effects for the rest of the province, the rest of the country in terms of keeping COVID-19 at. distance in the community. “

The numbers used in this story can be found in the Ontario Ministry of Health’s COVID-19 Daily epidemiological summary. The number of cases for a city or region may differ slightly from what is reported by the province, as local units report the numbers at different times.