Ontario reports 38 per cent increase in COVID-19 hospitalizations in last seven days

'Denial is going to crumble as cases rise' Epidemiologist Colin Furness says authorities in Canada 'opened the doors to a new variant and then eliminated all of our defences.'

Ontario health officials are reporting 1,091 people in hospital with COVID-19 Tuesday, including 173 patients in intensive care.

Tuesday’s count marks a 38 per cent increase in hospitalizations over the last seven days.

Of Tuesday’s hospitalizations, 184 patients are unvaccinated and 671 are fully vaccinated. The vaccination status of the remaining patients is unknown.

Forty-six per cent of patients being treated for COVID-19 in hospital Tuesday were admitted for COVID-19, while the remaining 54 per cent tested positive after an unrelated admission. In ICUs, those percentages are 67 per cent and 33 per cent, respectively.

Of Ontario patients currently being treated for COVID-19 in ICUs, 33 are unvaccinated and 68 are fully vaccinated. The vaccination status of the remaining patients is unknown.

Officials also reported nine new deaths due to COVID-19. Officials said six of the deaths occurred over the past 30 days, while three of them took place over a month ago.

Since the start of the pandemic, 12,479 individuals have lost their lives due to the disease.

With 14,474 tests processed in the past 24 hours, the Ministry of Health says the province's positivity rate is about 18 per cent.

The province reported 1,991 new cases of COVID-19 on Tuesday, but health officials have warned that number is an underestimate due to testing limitations and backlogs.

Wastewater data, provided by Ontario’s COVID-19 Science Table, confirms a provincial increase in infection. In nearly every region in the province, the concentration of the disease in wastewaters has started to rise.

The province deemed 2,117 more cases of the disease to be resolved as of Tuesday, bringing Ontario's number of recovered patients up to 1,139,179.

Today's report brings the total number of lab-confirmed cases in Ontario to 1,176,677.