Daily COVID-19 cases in London and Middlesex County rose slightly on Tuesday.
The Middlesex London Health Unit recorded 22 new infections over the previous 24 hours. That is up from 20 on Monday. It is the sixth consecutive day daily case numbers have been at or above the 20 mark.
The local case count since the pandemic began more than a year ago now stands at 6,637.
Two more screened variant positive cases have been identified in the region for a total of 54.
There are outbreaks at four area seniors' facilities - Chartwell Royalcliffe Retirement Residence, Dearness Home, Glendale Crossing, and Richmond Woods.
School outbreaks continue at Wilberforce Public in Lucan and St. Patrick’s Catholic Elementary and St. Michael’s Catholic Elementary in Woodstock. The two Woodstock schools are currently closed, while Wilberforce remains open. There are 11 active cases at nine local schools.
The London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) has only one current outbreak. It is on University Hospital's U4-medicine 1 unit where six patients and fewer than five staff members have tested positive for the virus. There are no deaths associated with this outbreak. The number of patients with COVID-19 in the care of the LHSC has risen to 13.
Resolved cases in London and Middlesex have increased to 6,263, leaving 189 known active cases.
As of Sunday, 64,783 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have made it into the arms of local residents. Dr. Chris Mackie, the region's medical officer of health, said during a briefing on Monday a vaccine supply shortage has left the health unit's three clinics operating under capacity. He also said plans for a fourth vaccination clinic at Earl Nichols arena have been put on hold indefinitely.
In Elgin and Oxford counties, there were nearly 20 new infections on Tuesday. Southwestern Public Health, the health unit for the region, said there were 17 new COVID-19 cases over the past 24 hours to bring the total caseload since last March to 2,716. The death toll is unchanged at 67 with no new COVID-19 deaths since February 20. The only seniors' facility with an ongoing case is Arches Transitional Bed Program Woodstock. A single staff infection has been reported there. Resolved cases are up to 2,571 with 78 known active cases in the two counties remaining.
Ontario’s daily case count dropped back under 1,600, but the positivity rate continued to climb.
Public health officials logged 1,546 new infections across the province on Tuesday. That’s down from 1,699 on Monday, 1,791 on Sunday, and 1,829 on Saturday.
Toronto had the province's highest daily number of cases over the past 24 hours with 465, that was followed by Peel with 329, and York Region with 161.
Ontario has confirmed 19 more cases of the variant first discovered in the U.K., known as B.1.1.7, for a total of 1,359. There were one new case each of the variant first associated with South Africa, known as B.1.351. and the variant first found in Brazil, known as P.1. That leaves the totals for those variants at 47 and 37.
Ontario total case count since the start of the pandemic now stands at 332,119.
There were nine additional deaths reported over the past 24 hours, including one involving a long-term care home resident. The provincial death toll is now 7,253.
At hospitals in Ontario, the number of COVID-19 positive patients has risen to 868. Of those, 324 are in intensive care and 193 are on ventilators.
The number of resolved cases rose to 309,849. There are currently 15,017 active cases of the virus in Ontario.
In the last 24 hour period, 32,556 COVID -19 tests were processed. That is up from 31,089 the previous day and brings the province positivity rate to 5.7 per cent. This is the sixth straight day there has been an increase in the positivity rate.
To date, the province has administered 1,603,699 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, with more than 300,000 people having received both shots required to be fully inoculated.
