The Middlesex London Health Unit recorded nearly a dozen new COVID-19 cases on Friday.
Eleven new infections were logged over the past 24 hours. That is the exact same number of new cases confirmed on Thursday, but is down from 13 on Wednesday and 14 on Tuesday. Daily case increases have been in the double-digits for all but five days this month.
The city and county’s total caseload since the pandemic began now sits at 14,463.
There has not been a COVID-19 related death in the area since October 21. That leaves the death toll unchanged at 245.
The number of resolved cases rose by 20 to 14,087. There are 131 known active cases in the region, up four over the past 24 hours.
The London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) has six COVID-19 inpatients in its care, the same number as reported on Thursday. Of those, five or fewer are listed in intensive care and none are admitted to Children’s Hospital. Currently, there are seven hospital staff who have tested positive for the virus.
A COVID-19 outbreak at Our Lady of the Pillar Academy in Strathroy was deemed over on the same day an outbreak was declared at Wilberforce Public School in Lucan. There are five active cases tied to the outbreak at Wilberforce, three of those infections were identified late Thursday. Other schools dealing with outbreaks include Clara Brenton Public, Covenant Christian School, and St. Nicholas Senior Catholic in London. All schools remain open.
Just over 68 per cent of the 605 new COVID-19 cases reported since September 17 were among people who were unvaccinated, not yet fully vaccinated or had not reached immunity after receiving the shot. The unvaccinated and those who have only received one dose accounted for 78.3 per cent of all hospitalizations locally over the last six weeks.
In Elgin and Oxford counties, there were nine new COVID-19 cases reported Friday, down from ten the previous day. Southwestern Public Health, the health unit for the region, said that brings the local total number of cases to 4,653 with 4,483 resolved. The area's death toll is unchanged at 91. There are currently 79 active cases. As of Thursday, 86.5 per cent of area residents aged 12 and older have had one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, while 83 per cent have received both doses.
Ontario recorded more than 400 new COVID-19 cases for a second straight day.
Public health officials confirmed 419 new infections Friday, up from 409 cases logged on Thursday, 321 cases on Wednesday, 269 on Tuesday, and 326 on Monday.
Preliminary data shows of the 419 new cases reported in Ontario over the past 24 hours, 231 were not vaccinated, 24 had received one dose, and 140 were fully vaccinated. There were 24 infected individuals whose vaccination status was not known.
Ontario’s total case count since the start of the pandemic now stands at 599,259.
There were no additional deaths reported, leaving the provincial death toll at 9,865.
Hospitals in Ontario have 211 COVID-19 positive patients admitted to general wards. There are 130 patients in intensive care and 100 are on ventilators. Of those on the general wards, 98 were unvaccinated, 14 were partially vaccinated, and 29 were fully vaccinated. Only 14 of those in ICU were fully vaccinated.
The number of resolved cases are up by 399 to 586,356. There are currently 3,038 active cases of the virus in Ontario.
In the last 24 hour period, 29,592 COVID-19 tests were processed, down from 31,383 the previous day. Ontario’s positivity rate remained at 1.3 per cent.
To date, the province has administered more than 22.4 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, with more than 10.9 million people having received both shots required to be fully inoculated.
