Ontario records over 500 new COVID-19 cases, slight increase over last two days

Businesses prepare to welcome back Ontarians Business owners have questions surrounding the provincial reopening, set to begin on Friday.

TORONTO — Health officials logged 590 new infections on Thursday, as well as 11 deaths related to the novel coronavirus.

The seven-day rolling average of daily reported COVID-19 cases continues to decline and now stands at about 618 down from 940 a week ago.

There are 516 people being treated for the novel coronavirus in Ontario hospitals. At least 450 of those patients are in intensive care, 27 of which are residents of Manitoba, according to the Ministry of Health.

With 31,423 tests processed in the last 24-hour period, the Ministry of Health says the province’s positivity rate stands at two per cent.

As of 12:01 a.m. Friday, Ontario will enter Step 1 of its reopening plan, allowing for patios to resume operation and non-essential retail to accept in-person customers again.

WHERE ARE THE COVID-19 CASES?

The majority of cases are found in Peel Region (130), Toronto (114), Waterloo (61), Hamilton (38), and York Region (32).

According to the province’s epidemiology report, 1,509 cases of the B.1.1.7. variant were identified in lab-positive tests in the previous 24-hours. These new cases bring the total number of B.1.1.7. variants in Ontario to 136,117.

The province also identified an additional 25 cases of the P.1. variant.

Ontario is not publicly reporting cases of the B.1.617 variant originally found in India.

ALMOST 1.4 MILLION PEOPLE FULLY VACCINATED

The province administered just over 182,350 vaccine doses in the last 24-hour period.

In total, over 10.6 million vaccine doses have made it into the arms of Ontarians. To date, 1,399,776 people have received two shots and are considered fully vaccinated.