Number of people in intensive care with COVID-19 climbs above 200 for the first time in more than a month

The number of COVID-19 patients in intensive care units has climbed above 200 for the first time in more than a month.

While wastewater surveillance data is increasingly suggesting that community transmission may have plateaued at around 100,000 new cases a day, hospitalizations are a considered a lagging indicator and could continue to rise in the short term.

The latest data released by the Ministry of Health on Monday suggests that there are now at least 1,301 people hospitalized with COVID-19, up approximately 19 per cent from this time last week.

That includes 202 people being treated in intensive care units, nearly half of whom are breathing with the assistance of a ventilator (91).

It is the highest number of people in the ICU with COVID-19 since March 16.

It should be noted that the hospitalization data is likely an undercount given that some hospitals typically don’t report occupancy numbers over the weekend.

Ontario’s Science Advisory Table has said that it expects hospitalizations will continue to rise through May. They say that under their most likely scenario the number of people in hospital with COVID-19 will peak at around 3,000, including approximately 500 in the ICU. In January, there were more than 4,000 people with COVID-19 in Ontario hospitals. The number of people in the ICU with COVID peaked at 626 on Jan. 18.

“If you look at out wastewater surveillance it shows very early, early signs that (transmission) is either plateauing or going down in many parts of the province. That is obviously a very positive sign. But you want to see that trend continue before you get confident that we are working our way out of this wave,” infectious disease specialist Dr. Isaac Bogoch told CP24 on Monday. “I think we always have to be careful, you can’t have a tonne of confidence in the COVID era about how things are going. But at least there are some very early signs that things are starting to improve in Ontario.”

Hospitalizations have been on the upswing for weeks now but are not increasing at the same rate that the province saw during the height of the fifth wave this past winter.

Back in early January when there were 266 people in intensive care with COVID-19 Ontario suspended elective surgeries and procedures for about three weeks in an effort to preserve healthcare resources.

However, Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Kieran Moore has suggested that he believes hospitals will have the resources to handle an uptick in patient volumes during this wave.

“Hospitalizations have risen pretty significantly from a few weeks ago but they are nowhere near where they were at in January and February,” Bogoch told CP24 on Monday.

Three net new deaths

Ontario also added another three net new deaths to its tally over the last two days after not releasing any data on Easter Sunday. The total death toll since the onset of the pandemic now stands at 12,632.

Meanwhile, the number of new cases confirmed through PCR testing over the last 48 hours was 4,669, compared to 5,882 over the same time-period last week.

Positivity rates do remain high with more than 19 per cent of all samples coming back positive over the last 48 hours.

There are also continues to be an increase in outbreaks in at least some of the settings that have access to government-funded PCR testing.

According to the latest data, there are now 182 active outbreaks in long-term care homes and 137 active outbreaks in retirement homes, compared to 137 and 103 outbreaks at this time last week.

The number of outbreaks in hospitals is also up slightly week-over-week (79 versus 74).

The numbers used in this story are found in the Ontario Ministry of Health's COVID-19 Daily Epidemiologic Summary. The number of cases for any city or region may differ slightly from what is reported by the province, because local units report figures at different times.