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 hospitals, down from 722 yesterday and 1,005 a week ago.
Among these patients, 119 are in the ICU compared to 154 a week ago.
Today is the lowest number of admissions to COVID-19 intensive care units since August 16, 2021, when the same number of patients were in critical care.
The ministry said 42% of hospitalized patients were admitted for COVID-19-related reasons, while 57% were admitted for other reasons and tested positive.
Meanwhile, 68% of ICU patients went to a hospital for virus-related reasons and 31% were admitted for other reasons and subsequently tested positive.
Provincial health officials today reported two more virus-related deaths, which they said occurred last month. One of the deaths was a resident of a long-term care home.
As of March 2020, the province has confirmed 13,267 deaths related to COVID-19.
Ontario labs have processed 10,783 tests in the last 24 hours, generating a positivity rate of 7.2 per cent. This is a minimum that has not been seen since the end of February, according to the ministry.
The province has also confirmed 1,038 more infections today, but health officials continue to advise that the daily count of cases is an understatement due to limited PCR testing.
Among the latest cases, 673 people received three or four doses of a vaccine against COVID-19, while 167 received two doses, 113 are partially or not vaccinated and 85 have an unknown vaccination status.
Infectious disease specialist Dr. Isaac Bogoch says the transmission of the virus is likely to slow this summer, as it has done in previous years, but notes that the province should prepare for cases to increase in the coming months.
“You don’t need a glass ball to see what happens in the fall. We will probably see an increase in COVID-19 cases in addition to other respiratory viral infections such as the flu. We have to plan ahead, “he told CP24 on Thursday morning.
“We have to ask ourselves, what will be the campaign to promote COVID-19? Who will succeed? Do we need it? Is it a population level event or is it just for selected groups or if someone? How we will integrate it with flu vaccines, which we should also do. “
Yesterday, health workers administered 15,179 doses of COVID-19 vaccine across Ontario.
To date, 90% of Ontarians aged five and over have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 87% have received two and 52% have received three.
The numbers used in this story are in the COVID-19 Daily Epidemiological Summary of the Ontario Ministry of Health. The number of cases for any city or region may differ slightly from what the province reports, because local units report figures at different times.