Ontario reports 2,662 new COVID-19 cases, 87 more deaths

Other public health units that saw double-digit increases were:

• Niagara Region: 95
• Durham Region: 80
• Hamilton: 78
• Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph: 77
• Ottawa: 75
• Simcoe Muskoka: 71
• Middlesex-London: 65
• Thunder Bay: 58
• Eastern Ontario: 37
• Huron-Perth: 26
• Southwestern: 19
• Haliburton, Kawartha, Pine Ridge: 16
• Sudbury:13
• Chatham-Kent: 11

(Note: All of the figures used in this story are found on the Ministry of Health’s COVID-19 dashboard or in its Daily Epidemiologic Summary. The number of cases for any region may differ from what is reported by the local public health unit, because local units report figures at different times.)

They come as labs processed 71,750 test samples for the virus and reported a provincewide test positivity rate of 3.3 per cent, the lowest it has been since mid-December.

Further, the seven-day average of daily cases dropped to 2,703, marking 11 straight days of decreases.

Another 3,375 infections were marked resolved in today’s report. There were 25,263 confirmed, active infections in Ontario yesterday — a figure that has also been trending downward since its peak on Jan 11. 

According to the province’s data, the number of people with COVID-19 in hospitals, as well as those requiring intensive care and ventilators all decreased.

As of yesterday, the total number of COVID-19 patients that were:

• In hospitals: 1,512 (down 21)
• Being treated in intensive care units: 383 (down five)
• On ventilators: 291 (down two)

There were ongoing outbreaks of the illness in 244, or about 39 per cent, of Ontario’s 626 long-term care homes. Revised projections recently released by the province’s COVID-19 Science Advisory Table suggested if Ontario were to accelerate its immunization rollout and vaccinate all long-term care home residents by the end of January, rather than mid-February, as many as 580 lives could be saved.

The 87 additional deaths push Ontario’s official COVID-19-linked death toll to 5,701.

Meanwhile, the province said it administered 13,784 doses of vaccines Thursday. A total of 264, 985 shots have been given out, while 49,292 people have received both doses. 

#StayHomeON media campaign

The provincial government said it has a new #StayHomeON campaign, which will include messages from various online “influencers” and politicians, including a video from Rick Mercer posted this morning. 

Lisa MacLeod, minister of heritage, sport, tourism and culture industries, said in a news release that athletes on the Toronto Raptors and Ottawa Senators will also be participating. 

Markedly absent from the province’s expanded effort to get Ontarians to stay home is the availability of permanent paid sick days, which the Progressive Conservative government eliminated in 2018.

The government’s own medical and science advisers, as well as a chorus of municipal officials and activists, have repeatedly called for Premier Doug Ford and his cabinet to implement paid sick days, especially for essential and low-wage workers in the manufacturing, warehousing and food processing sectors. 

Ford has instead pointed to the federal Canada Recovery Sickness Benefit, which offers $500 per week for up to two weeks eligible workers. Critics have noted, however, that the program amounts to less than minimum wage and the financial assistance is not immediate. 

More cases at Canada Post facility

Meanwhile, mandatory testing at a Mississauga Canada Post facility found 27 asymptomatic cases of COVID-19 in 48 hours.

Canada Post said 149 workers at its massive Dixie Road site had tested positive between Jan. 1 and Thursday afternoon. Spokesman Phil Legault said the latest cases were detected among workers who were asymptomatic or didn’t believe they had symptoms.

Testing of the entire shift was ordered by Peel Public Health and began Jan. 19. Legault said Canada Post is now offering voluntary testing to employees working outside the public health-identified shift.

More than 4,500 people work at the Mississauga site.