The London region’s daily case count was up slightly on Friday.
The Middlesex London Health Unit logged 22 new infections over the past 24 hours. That is up from 18 on Thursday but down from 33 on Wednesday. Daily case numbers have been below 50 for 13 straight days and have not reached the triple-digits in nearly a month.
The region has recorded a total of 12,321 cases since the pandemic began.
It has been two days since a COVID-19 related death was reported locally. That leaves the London and Middlesex County death toll at 220. On Wednesday, the health unit reported a man in his 70s had succumbed to the virus. He was not linked to a seniors' facility.
The number of resolved cases rose by 41 since Thursday for a total of 11,886. There are currently 174 known active cases in the region, down from 376 a week ago.
The London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) reported one more person has been admitted with the virus for a total of 30 COVID-19 inpatients. Of those, nine were listed in intensive care. There were fewer than five out of region patients in acute care and intensive care. However, that number could be going up, as the LHSC takes in COVID-19 patients from Manitoba. The latest out of province patient was transferred in on Thursday night.
The number of cases involving variants of concern identified in the area has risen by 27 to 3,121. There have been 3,043 cases involving the B.1.1.7 variant that originated in the U.K., 73 cases of the P.1 variant from Brazil, including one sublineage, two cases of the B.1.351 variant from South Africa, and three cases of the B.1.617 variant, originally found in India.
There are two ongoing outbreaks in the area - one at Kensington Village Retirement, the other at Simply Kids daycare.
As of last Saturday, more than 282,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccines had been administered in Middlesex-London. Nearly 57% of the adult population has received their first dose, but only about 3.7% have received two doses.
In Elgin and Oxford counties, the number of new cases was under five for a fourth consecutive day. Southwestern Public Health, the health unit for the region, said there were just four new COVID-19 infections recorded Friday. The region’s total number of cases is now 3,806 with 3,682 resolved. The death toll was unchanged at 82. Currently, there are 42 active cases in the two counties. As of last Saturday, 49.9 per cent of local residents have received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine and 2.9 per cent have been given both doses.
It has now been five days since the number of new COVID-19 cases in Ontario has been above 1,000.
Public health officials confirmed 914 new infections across the province on Friday. That is up from 870 on Thursday. Daily case counts on Wednesday and Tuesday were 733 and 699.
Toronto had the province’s highest daily number of cases on Friday with 214, followed by Peel with 169, Durham with 69, and Hamilton with 59.
Ontario’s total case count since the start of the pandemic now stands at 534,675.
There have been another 1,248 new cases of the variant originating from the U.K. in Ontario. That brings the province’s total number of B.1.1.7.cases, now known as “Alpha," to 129,807. Cases of the B.1.351 (Beta) and P.1 (Gamma) variants are up by 18 and 46 for a total of 972 and 2,967.
There were 19 additional deaths reported over the past 24 hours. The provincial death toll is now 8,820.
Hospitalizations in Ontario are down with 687 COVID-19 positive patients admitted. Of those, 522 are in intensive care and 357 are on ventilators.
The number of resolved cases rose to 516,396. There are currently 9,459 active cases of the virus in Ontario.
In the last 24 hour period, 32,258 COVID-19 tests were processed, down from 34,277 the previous day. Ontario’s current positivity rate held at 2.8 per cent.
To date, the province has administered 9,661,327 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, with 896,065 people having received both shots required to be fully inoculated.
