Ontario is reporting fewer than 200 new COVID-19 cases for the sixth consecutive day and seven more deaths on Wednesday.

Provincial health officials logged 153 new coronavirus infections, up from 146 cases on Tuesday but down from 194 cases reported a week ago.

The province recorded 114 new infections on Monday, 166 on Sunday and 179 on Saturday.

The seven-day rolling average now stands at 164, compared to 204 seven days ago.

To date, there have been 9,265 virus-related deaths in the province.

Another 216 people recovered from the disease in the past 24 hours, resulting in 1,478 active cases across the province.

Ontario labs processed over 29,000 tests in the past 24 hours, resulting in a positivity rate of 0.6 per cent, according to the Ministry of Health.

More than 400 lab-confirmed cases of variants of concern were reported in the province today, with 305 being the dominant Delta variant, which first originated in India.

In the Greater Toronto Area, 28 new cases were logged in Toronto, while 19 infections were reported in Peel Region, five in York Region, four in Halton and three in Durham.

There are currently 180 patients in intensive care units across the province receiving treatment due to the virus.

Of those in ICUs, 116 are breathing with the assistance of a ventilator.

Local public health units and hospital networks said Thursday there are a total of 214 patients in hospitals due to COVID-19 infection.

Since January 2020, more than 547,500 lab-confirmed cases and 536,819 recoveries have been reported in Ontario.

More than 7.8 million people are fully vaccinated in Ontario after receiving two doses of approved vaccines.

Over 17.4 million doses have been administered in the province since vaccinations began in mid-December.

The latest numbers come as Ontario is preparing to enter Step 3 of the COVID-19 reopening framework on Friday at 12:01 a.m. This step will allow for indoor dining to resume, and gyms and theatres to reopen their doors.

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.