Ontario is reporting the lowest number of COVID-19 patients in intensive care in 10 months as virus-related hospitalizations continued to decline.
According to the Ministry of Health, there are 670 patients with the virus in Ontario’s hospitals, down from 722 yesterday and 1,005 a week ago.
Among those patients, 119 are in the ICU compared to 154 a week ago.
Today marks the lowest number of COVID-19 intensive care unit admissions since Aug. 16, 2021 when the same number of patients were in critical care.
The ministry said 42 per cent of hospitalized patients were admitted for COVID-19 related reasons, while 57 per cent were admitted for other reasons and tested positive.
Meanwhile, 68 per cent of ICU patients went to a hospital for virus-related reasons and 31 per cent were admitted for other reasons and subsequently tested positive.
Provincial health officials reported two more virus-related deaths today, which they said occurred in the past month. One of the deaths was a long-term care home resident.
Since March 2020, the province has confirmed 13,267 COVID-19-related deaths.
Ontario labs have processed 10,783 tests in the past 24 hours, generating a positivity rate of 7.2 per cent. This is a low not seen since late February, according to the ministry.
The province also confirmed 1,038 more infections today, however health officials continue to advise that daily case counts are an underestimate due to limited PCR testing.
Among the latest cases, 673 individuals received three or four doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 167 received two doses, 113 are partially or unvaccinated, and 85 have an unknown vaccination status.
Infectious Diseases Specialist Dr. Isaac Bogoch says virus transmission will likely decline this summer, as it has in previous years, but notes that the province should prepare for cases to rise in the coming months.
“You don't need a crystal ball to see what's going to happen in the fall. We'll probably see a rise in cases of COVID-19 in addition to other respiratory viral infections like the flu. We have to plan ahead for that,” he told CP24 Thursday morning.
“We have to ask ourselves, what is the campaign going to be for boosting for COVID-19? Who's going to get it? Do we need it? Is it a population level event or is it just for select groups or if anyone? How are we going to integrate that with flu vaccines, which we should be doing as well.”
Yesterday, health-care workers administered 15,179 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine across Ontario.
To date, 90 per cent of Ontarians aged five years and older have received t least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 87 per cent have received two doses and 52 per cent have received three.
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.
