Ontario is reporting 2,093 new COVID-19 cases and 56 more deaths, as test completion rose significantly on Thursday.

Labs completed more than 64,000 tests in the past 24 hours, generating a positivity rate of 3.3 per cent when errors and duplicate tests are accounted for.

Labs processed 55,191 tests in the previous 24-hour span.

“Locally, there are 700 new cases in Toronto, 331 in Peel, 228 in York Region and 123 in Niagara,” Health Minister Christine Elliott wrote on Twitter.

Thirty-one of the fifty-six deaths occurred in residents of long-term care homes.

The total lab-confirmed death toll since March in the province now stands at 6,014.

It was 4,581 at the start of the month.

Ontario reported 1,670 new cases on Wednesday, a decline of about 1,000 from the week before, as well as 1,740 new cases on Tuesday.

Thursday’s number sent the seven-day rolling average of cases down to 2,128, from 2,205 one day earlier.

Infectious diseases specialist Dr. Isaac Bogoch said Thursday’s data showed considerable progress, but the numbers need to decline further.

“Clear arrows are pointing in the right direction but obviously, we are still far from where we need to be,” he told CP24.

He said it would not be acceptable “to plateau at 1,200 to 1,500 cases per day.”

The case declines are important to ensure hospital occupancy decreases and elective surgery can resume.

“As we continue to see fewer cases per day, that will eventually translate into fewer hospital admissions and that will eventually translate into fewer ICU stays,” Bogoch said.

Hospitalizations fell to 1,338 according to Ministry of Health data, down 44 from Wednesday.

But local public health units and hospital networks said there were 1,488 people in hospital on Thursday.

The number of people in intensive care fell to 358 while the number of people breathing with a ventilator was 276.

The province also revealed Thursday that officials were overstating the number of completed COVID-19 vaccinations, failing to properly interpret their own data.

More than 11,000 vaccines were administered in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of shots administered up to 317,000.

Elsewhere in the GTA, Durham Region reported 85 new cases, Halton reported 64 and Hamilton reported 94.