Ontario reported 1,791 new COVID-19 cases on Sunday along with 18 additional deaths, as the active caseload across the province rose to its highest point since Feb. 8.

The province reported 1,829 new cases on Saturday and 1,745 on Friday, the two highest standalone counts reported since Ontario’s stay at home order ended gradually from February to early March.

The seven-day rolling average of cases now stands at 1,538, up from 1,401 one week ago.

Two of the deaths reported on Sunday involved residents of the long-term care system.

Across the GTA, Toronto report 495 new cases, Peel reported 350 new cases, York reported 177 new cases and Durham reported 106 new cases.

Provincial labs processed 49,200 test specimens and officials said the overall positivity rate was 3.7 per cent.

There are now 14,230 known active cases of COVID-19 across Ontario, the highest that number has been since Feb. 8.

More than 7,200 people are known to have died of infection since March 2020.

Patio dining resumed in Toronto and Peel over the balmy weekend, while occupancy levels for indoor dining permitted in all other areas of the GTHA were increased.

Epidemiologist Colin Furness told CTV News Toronto the decision to increase indoor dining occupancy as infections continue to rise amounted to “asking to be clobbered.”

“We’re going to have a very difficult April and a very difficult May,” he said.

Modelling developed by provincial epidemiologists suggested Ontario could hit 4,000 cases per day by early April, even outside of the worst-case scenario.

Hospitalizations continued a slow trend upwards.

The Ministry of Health said there were 760 people in hospital due to COVID-19 on Sunday. Of those, 305 were in intensive care and 186 were breathing with the help of a ventilator.

The province says more than 40,000 additional COVID-19 doses were given out on Saturday, bringing the total number of shots administered to 1,521,705.

More than 298,549 people have completed the full two-dose inoculation.

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.