On a day that people waited hours in line to get tested for COVID-19, the Middlesex London Health Unit repeorted another six new cases in the community.
The new cases bring the total for London and Middlesex County since the pandemic began to 765. Two more recoveries were reported Wednesday, bringing that total to 680. No new deaths were reported. The death toll remained at 57 as no new COVID-19 related deaths have been reported since June 12.
Once again, people lined up for hours at London’s two COVID-19 assessment centres. Around 1 p.m., the health unit tweeted that the wait time at the Carling Heights assessment centre was three hours long, while the wait at the Oakridge Arena facility was two hours.
Following a single day with no new infections, Southwestern Public Health reported four additional COVID-19 cases in Elgin and Oxford counties on Wednesday. So far this week, there have been just six new cases -- two Monday and four on Wednesday -- recorded in the region to bring the total case count to 262.
There were no new recoveries over the last 24 hours, leaving the number of resolved cases at 248.
The death toll is unchanged at five with no additional deaths reported since July 3.
The number of active cases in the two counties stands at nine.
New cases in Ontario surged again on Wednesday.
Public health officials said there were 315 new infections confirmed since Tuesday. That is the biggest single-day jump since June 6 when 387 cases were reported.
Of the province's 34 public health units, 25 recorded five or fewer cases with 12 reporting no new cases at all. The largest increase of new cases came from Toronto with 77, Ottawa with 61, Peel with 54, and York with 37. Durham Region also saw 24 new cases.
According to Health Minister Christine Elliott, younger Ontarians continue to make up the bulk of the new cases.
"Sixty-four per cent of today’s cases are in people under the age of 40," tweeted Elliott.
Ontario's case count since the start of the pandemic now sits at 45,383.
The number of COVID-19 related deaths rose to 2,822 with two additional deaths recorded on Wednesday.
Recoveries across the province are up by 154 to 40,245.
Currently, 44 infected Ontarians are in hospital receiving treatment, with 20 in the intensive care unit.
Over the past 24 hours, the province conducted nearly 29,000 additional COVID-19 tests.