Ontario reported nearly 800 new COVID-19 cases and four more deaths on Friday as Health Canada approved a vaccine for children aged five and up.

Provincial health officials logged 793 new infections today, up from 711 on Thursday and a notable rise from 598 a week ago.

Today marks the highest case tally since Sept. 18 when 821 new infections were reported.

Earlier this week, the province reported 552 new cases on Monday, 481 on Tuesday and 512 on Wednesday.

The seven-day rolling average of new infections now stands at 625, up from 537 this time a week ago.

Among the latest cases, 385 of the individuals are unvaccinated, 22 are partially vaccinated, 323 are fully vaccinated and 63 have an unknown vaccination status.

To date, over 88 per cent of eligible Ontarians have received one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 85 per cent have received two doses and are considered fully vaccinated.

On Friday, Health Canada approved Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine for children aged five to 11, a month after the company submitted its request.

The federal government said it is expecting an accelerated delivery of 2.9 million child-sized doses soon, enough to provide first doses to all children in this age group.

Yesterday, Toronto Mayor John Tory said children in the city would be able to get their first dose within “a few days” of Health Canada’s approval.

Another 567 people recovered from the virus in the past 24 hours, resulting in 5,094 active cases across the province.

The four deaths reported today occured in the last month and the province’s virus-related death toll now stands at 9,959, according to the Ministry of Health.

Ontario labs processed more than 30,500 tests yesterday, producing a positivity rate of 2.6 per cent, relatively unchanged from a week ago, the ministry says.

In the Greater Toronto Area, 115 new cases were logged in Toronto, 60 in York Region, 54 in Peel Region, 28 in Halton and 25 in Durham.

Elsewhere in the province, 71 new infections were reported in Simcoe Muskoka, 55 in Windsor-Essex, 41 in Hamilton, and 37 in both Sudbury and Southwestern.

The ministry says there are 269 people in hospitals with the virus across the province and 128 in intensive care units.

Of those in ICU, 72 are breathing with the help of a ventilator.

Health Minister Christine Elliott says 116 of the ICU patients are not fully vaccinated or have an unknown vaccination status and 12 are fully vaccinated.

Eleven of the ICU patients in Ontario hospitals are transfers from Saskatchewan.

To date, there have been 610,222 lab-confirmed coronavirus cases and 595,169 recoveries in Ontario since Jan. 2020.

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.