The sixth COVID-19 wave appears to be in London and Middlesex County’s rearview.
Dr. Alex Summers, the region’s medical officer of health, shared the promising news during the Middlesex London Health Unit’s weekly COVID-19 media briefing on Monday.
“We are clearly on the back end of the sixth wave with an ongoing improvement in COVID-19 transmission in our community,” said Summers.
“Week by week we are seeing declines in case counts amongst those that are eligible for testing. We’re seeing gradual declines of the per cent positivity of the tests that are being done. Wastewater data across the province and in Southwestern Ontario continues to decline. Hospitalizations are declining. And ICU admissions have remained low throughout this wave and have certainly stabilized and don’t show any sign of increase.”
The health unit logged 108 new COVID-19 cases over the weekend – 26 on Monday, 44 on Sunday, and 38 on Saturday. There has not been a death linked to the virus locally since last Thursday. As of Monday, there were 35 infected inpatients in the care of the London Health Sciences Centre, including five or fewer in the intensive care unit.
“We’re at about the same number of admissions we had in the first week of April, and we peaked around or about April 22,” said Adam Dukelow, the hospital network’s chief medical officer.
He added that an outbreak remains active in one wing at University Hospital and 138 staffers have tested positive for the virus.
“That still represents a significant strain on our hospital resources in terms of caring for patients with COVID, but thankfully, I do believe we’re past the peak of the sixth wave from a hospitalization perspective,” said Dukelow.
Summers attributes the decline in transmission to temporary community immunity achieved through good vaccination coverage and previous infection.
“The reality is that the Omicron wave has impacted our population greatly and it means that between vaccination and previous infection there just frankly are less people left to get COVID-19,” said Summers.
He expects the warm weather will continue to improve the region’s COVID-19 outlook, as people spend more time outdoors instead of indoors where the risk of transmission is higher.
“It will be a great help throughout the later spring and summer,” said Summers.
While he is optimistic there will not be another wave driven by Omicron, a new variant could come along and drastically change the summer outlook.
“That threat is always somewhat around the corner. The high vaccination coverage that we have at this time is going to be essential in responding to whatever variant does come,” said Summers.“Even if a vaccine is not as effective against a new variant, it has consistently provided some protection, particularly against severe outcomes and death.”
Going forward, he urges residents to continue hand-washing, wearing a mask, and to keep vaccinations up to date.
