Ontario sees another dip in number of new COVID-19 cases

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TORONTO — Ontario has recorded another dip in the number of new COVID-19 cases.

Provincial health officials logged 119 new infections of the novel coronavirus on Monday, marking the third day in a row that Ontario’s daily case count has been below 150.

Following a spike of 195 new cases being reported on Friday, Ontario saw 138 more patients confirmed on Saturday and 137 on Sunday.

Over the past 10 days, the province has seen the daily case count range between 103 and 203.

The total case count in Ontario is now 38,799.

Of the new patients confirmed on Monday, 64 per cent are under the age of 40.

When asked for any possible reason beside this steady statistic, Ontario’s Associate Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Barbara Yaffe said on Monday afternoon that it is largely due to private gatherings.

“Originally it appeared that it was mostly people in their 20s that were getting infected at private parties but it turns out it’s not just young people,” she said. “We’ve had people in their 50s who had private parties at their cottage, for example, even while they were symptomatic.”

“So it isn’t just young people, it seems to be people across the span of age who are not taking public health measures as seriously as they have been.”

One additional COVID-19 death was confirmed in the province on Monday, bringing Ontario’s death toll to 2,764.

There are currently 82 patients infected with the disease in Ontario hospitals. Of those patients, 30 are being treated in the intensive care unit and 18 of those are breathing with the assistance of a ventilator.

While updating the hospitalization counts in Ontario on Monday, health officials stated that approximately 30 hospitals did not submit data on Saturday.

“We anticipate that there may be an increase in the number of hospitalized patients when we have more complete reporting,” officials said.

The number of recovered patients in Ontario is now 34,461.

Where are the new COVID-19 cases?

Thirty of Ontario’s 34 local public health units reported five or fewer cases of the novel coronavirus on Monday. Sixteen of those regions recorded zero cases.

According to Monday’s epidemiological summary, there are 28 new infections in Ottawa, 40 in Windsor-Essex, 20 in Toronto and four in Peel Region.

Toronto, Peel Region and Windsor-Essex have all been held back from advancing to Stage 3 of the province’s reopening plan due to their daily case counts.

As of July 24, the rest of Ontario is in Stage 3.

COVID-19 testing in Ontario

Provincial health officials have conducted more than two million COVID-19 tests since the start of the pandemic.

In the last 24 hours, more than 24,000 tests were conducted in Ontario.

There are currently 9,249 tests under investigation in the province.