Ontario is reporting more than 700 new COVID-19 infections today, the highest daily case count recorded in the province in nearly two months.
Provincial health officials logged 711 new COVID-19 cases today, up from 512 on Wednesday and 642 one week ago.
It is the highest single-day tally reported since Sept. 24, when 727 new infections were confirmed.
The seven-day rolling average of new cases is now approaching 600. The average daily case count hit 597 today, up from 532 last Thursday.
Five more virus-related deaths were confirmed today, bringing Ontario’s COVID-19 death toll to 9,955.
Of the new cases confirmed today, 322 involve those who are unvaccinated, 314 are in those who are fully immunized, 47 involve people with an unknown vaccination status, and 28 are in individuals who are just partially vaccinated.
While there has not been a dramatic spike in case growth in Ontario's largest municipalities, it appears some smaller regions are struggling to keep COVID-19 at bay, including Simcoe-Muskoka, which has seen a surge in infections over the past two weeks. The public health units with the highest number of new cases today include Toronto (74), Windsor (71), Simcoe-Muskoka (67), Ottawa (42), Peel Region (40), York Region (39), Waterloo Region (37), and Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington (37).
Ontario's known active COVID-19 caseload reached 4,872 on Thursday, up from 4,269 last week.
Despite a rise in daily cases in regions across the province, other key metrics appear to be stable. The Ministry of Health says there are currently 129 people in the ICU with COVID-19, down marginally from 132 last week. This number includes close to a dozen patients who were transferred to Ontario from Saskatchewan.
According to Ontario's Science Advisory Table, as of Nov. 14, the province's effective reproductive (RT) number is 1.09, meaning that every 100 new cases will go on to generate 109 secondary infections. This is down from 1.24 last week.
With 34,347 tests processed over the past 24 hours, officials are reporting a provincewide positivty rate of two per cent, down slightly from 2.1 per cent one week ago.
On Wednesday, sources confirmed to CTV News that the federal government plans to drop its policy requiring fully vaccinated travellers to provide a negative COVID-19 PCR test for trips under 72 hours.
Dr. Issac Bogoch, an infectious diseases specialist with Toronto General Hospital, said the decision is good news for Canadians.
“People would have to get a PCR test in Canada to go to the United States... and use that same PCR test to return to Canada. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense and I'm glad that was dropped,” he told CP24 on Thursday morning.
“It is a prohibitive test. Those tests, depending on where you are, cost $150 to $200... Imagine you've got a family of four individuals. All of a sudden a quick cross-border trip is out of reach for many Canadians. So not only is it unhelpful, it is also an unfair policy.”
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.
