Ontario’s top public health official is raising concerns about “COVID fatigue” amid a steady increase in cases that has pushed the province’s seven-day average past 1,100 for the first time ever.

Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. David Williams made the comment during a briefing on Monday afternoon, just hours after another 1,242 new cases of COVID-19 and 12 new deaths were reported by the Ministry of Health.

The latest number pushes Ontario’s seven-day average up to 1,105. That is up 20 per cent from this time last week when it stood at 919.

“I am concerned about the tuning out. Not just tuning out me but tuning out in general to the evidence and science,” Williams said. “People are getting mis-science (SIC) and misinformation from different media sources and from social media and I think you really just have to make sure that you listen to the public health experts in your area. Listen to what your medical officer of health has to say and the premier and the minister of health. We are all having the same messaging so we need you to tune back in again.”

Of the new cases reported on Monday, 483 were in Toronto, which is a new single-day record for the city.

There were also 279 new cases in Peel, 107 in York Region, 37 in Halton Region and 14 in Durham Region.

The overall positivity percentage was also up to 4.37 per cent, as the province only turned around 28,401 tests over the last 24 hours. That is down from 35,577 in the previous period.

Speaking with reporters, Williams said that if everybody followed public health advice “to a T” hard-hit regions like Peel and Toronto could be back in the green in the province’s colour-coded framework for COVID-19 restrictions in three or four weeks.

Unfortunately, he acknowledged that such a widespread shift might not be possible immediately.

“That is pretty aspirational because people in this point in time I think are suffering from COVID fatigue,” he said. “We do have to make sure we look at these numbers with a certain level of sobriety and say this is a concerning trend and direction.”

Nearly 10,000 active cases

There are now 9,514 active cases of novel coronavirus infection in the province, up from 7,981 at the start of the month.

Six of Monday’s deaths involved residents of the long-term care system.

Ontario added 1,328 new cases on Sunday, 1,132 on Saturday, 1,003 on Friday and 998 on Thursday.

At a press conference earlier in the day, Williams said that new case growth was running just above the scenario modelling developed in October had predicted – 800 to 1,200 new cases per day.

But that modelling said in the worst case, Ontario’s daily case growth could hit 2,000 by the middle of the month and during his subsequent briefing Williams suggested that new modelling could be released on Thursday

“You have to catch people’s attention and part of that is not with hyperbole but with actual data and facts,” he said.

The province says hospitalizations declined by seven to 367 across the province, with 84 patients in the ICU and 54 breathing with the help of a ventilator, but officials cautioned dozens of hospitals did not provide them with data on Sunday.

But a count of data from local hospital networks and public health units found 400 people hospitalized due to COVID-19 across the province.