Ontario reports fewer than 2,200 new COVID-19 cases, another 30 deaths

Omicron-targeted vaccines going into arms in Ont. The first Omicron-targeted booster is going into arms in Ontario and is now available for everyone 18 years of age and up.

TORONTO — Ontario is reporting just under 2,200 new infections of COVID-19, marking a full week in which daily case numbers have remained below 3,000.

The 2,199 cases added Sunday mark a decrease from the 2,584 logged on Saturday.

This brings Ontario’s lab-confirmed COVID-19 case total to 509,316, including 474,175 recoveries and 8,485 deaths. Health officials said that at least 30 of those deaths were reported in the last 24 hours.

Currently, there are 26,656 active cases of the novel coronavirus across the province. The seven-day average for number of cases reported is 2,430. A week ago that number was 3,120.

With 33,142 tests processed since yesterday, the Ministry of Health says Ontario’s COVID-19 positivity rate is 6.8 per cent.

Meanwhile, the number of COVID-19 hospitalizations dropped dramatically overnight. According to data provided by the province, there are 254 fewer patients in hospital with the disease.

Of the remaining 1,292 patients in hospital, 785 are being treated in intensive care -- a number that has remained high over the past several weeks.

Where are the new COVID-19 cases?

Most of the cases reported by the province Sunday were found in Toronto (633), Peel Region (547), and York Region (172).

Case counts in the triple digits were also recorded in Durham Region (143) and Hamilton (129).

Ontario is under a provincewide stay-home-order which is set to expire on June 2.

Update on COVID-19 variants of concern

The province confirmed 1,498 cases of the COVID-19 variant known as B.1.1.7 in the last 24-hour period.

There are now 107,541 instances of the strain, which was first discovered in the U.K., in Ontario.

Another 130 cases of P.1 (Brazilian variant) were logged, bringing the case total to 1,983.

At least 52 other B.1.351 (South African variant) infections were also found, bringing the case total to 677.

Ontario does not currently report how many cases of the B.1.617 variant, originally found in India, are in the province.

A Public Health Ontario (PHO) spokesperson told CP24 that the province will not develop a mass screening tool to easily and quickly detect the variant, as officials said they are now aware of 45 cases throughout the province.

More than 7 million doses administered

More than seven million residents have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine as of Sunday.

Some 139,000 of those needles went into arms yesterday.

The province says that more than 429,000 people have received both a first and second dose and are considered to be fully vaccinated.