For the third straight day, COVID-19 hospitalizations in the London region have decreased.
The London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) reported it has 27 inpatients with the virus, down two over the past 24 hours. It is the fewest COVID positive patients the hospital network has had in its care so far this year. Of the 27 people currently in hospital, there are 12 being treated for COVID-19 and 15 being treated for other ailments but who have also tested positive for the virus.
COVID-19 admissions to the intensive care unit remained at five or fewer. There are also five or fewer COVID-19 patients in the care of Children’s Hospital.
Figures surrounding infected hospital workers were not as positive on Thursday. The LHSC said it currently has 167 staffers who have contracted the virus, that is up from 155 on Wednesday.
The Middlesex London Health Unit logged 60 new cases on Thursday. However, daily infection tallies aren’t as meaningful since the provincial government limited who can receive a free PCR test at the end of December. The total number of cases locally since March of 2020 is now 32,906 according to the health unit.
The local death toll was unchanged at 354.
The number of resolved cases is up to 31,878. Currently, there are 674 known active cases in the region.
Southwestern Public Health, the health unit for Elgin and Oxford counties, does not update its COVID-19 cases dashboard on Thursdays. Its next update will be released on Friday.
Provincially, the number of people infected with COVID-19 in intensive care units in Ontario fell below 200 for the first time this year.
The latest figures released by the province show there are 644 people with COVID-19 admitted to hospitals in Ontario on Thursday. That is down five since Wednesday. The provincial breakdown of hospitalization numbers shows 47 per cent of those admitted were because of COVID-19 and 53 per cent are being treated for other reasons but also have tested positive for COVID-19.
There are 199 people in intensive care units across the province, a decrease of five from Wednesday.
Public health officials said there were 2,398 new cases in Ontario on Thursday. Public health officials cautioned those numbers are considered an underestimate of the spread of the virus though, as eligibility for free PCR tests in Ontario have been extremely limited.
The province’s total case count since the start of the pandemic now sits at 1,131,941.
Nineteen additional deaths related to the virus were reported on Thursday, to bring the death toll up to 12,307. The province said 13 of the latest deaths occurred over the past 30 days and six occurred more than a month ago.
The number of resolved cases rose by 2,395 to 1,104,237.
In the last 24 hour period, 14,648 tests COVID-19 tests were processed. Ontario’s positivity rate is now 12.3 per cent, up from 11.2 per cent a week ago and 10.2 per cent two weeks ago.
The province has administered 31,929,540 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, as of Wednesday night. Nearly 93 per cent of Ontarians 12 and older have received one dose of the vaccine, while 90.8 per cent have been given a second dose. More than 7.1 million booster shots have been administered.
Read original story from London Ontario – BlackburnNews.com