Soon, public health officials will offer a fourth dose against COVID-19 to residents living in long-term care and retirement homes across Windsor-Essex.
The Ontario government announced back on December 30 residents can get their fourth shot 84 days after their booster.
Windsor-Essex County Health Unit CEO Nicole Dupuis said as soon as the government made the announcement, it started getting calls.
Immediately, the health unit started working with long-term care homes and other congregate settings to set up a vaccination timetable.
There are outbreaks of COVID-19 at 11 facilities now. However, Acting Medical Officer of Health Doctor Shanker Nesathurai said the situation has changed since the beginning of the pandemic when over 4,000 elderly residents died in the first wave of the pandemic.
"We have procedures and policies to effectuate containment, as best as possible," he explained. "In long-term care, the population is substantively vaccinated."
The health unit reported an additional two deaths on Monday, a man in his 70s and a woman in her 90s. However, both lived in the community.
It added another 1,288 new cases to the overall case count since Friday. On Saturday, 415 were confirmed. There were 576 on Sunday and 297 on Monday morning.
Public health officials caution that is likely an underestimate of the total number of new infections because testing is currently limited.
While 1,112 cases remain under investigation, 109 are from close contact with someone who previously tested positive for the virus, and 56 caught it in the community. Another five are travel-related, and six were traced back to outbreaks.
A total of 3,356 people in the community are actively sick with COVID-19, and 67 are in the hospital.
