The London region is starting the week with a slightly lower number of new COVID-19 cases than what was recorded over the weekend.
The Middlesex London Health Unit reported 12 new infections on Monday, down from 23 on Sunday and 17 on Saturday. The only other day this month with a lower single-day case tally was last Tuesday when just seven infections were logged.
The area’s total case count stands at 13,818 since the pandemic began.
There has not been an additional COVID-19 related death recorded locally since Tuesday, when a man in his 60s succumbed to the virus. The death toll remains at 237.
Resolved cases in the city and county are up by 13 to 13,385. Currently, there are 196 active cases in the region, the eighth straight day active cases have been below 200.
There were six additional cases involving variants of concern identified in the region Monday, increasing the total to 4,173. The Alpha B.1.1.7 variant accounts for 3,384 of the cases. There are 124 cases of the Gamma P.1. variant, two cases identified as the Beta B.1.351 variant, and 659 cases of the B.1.617 variant. There are 189 cases that have tested positive for a mutation.
An outbreak continues on the first two floors of Earls Court Village in London. The outbreak, which is the only one involving an area long-term care or retirement home, was declared last Thursday.
Twenty-three schools in the region are dealing with a combined 33 active cases, including one school with a declared outbreak. The health unit announced the outbreak at École élémentaire La Pommeraie, in southwest London on Friday. There are currently four cases linked to the outbreak. There are two other cases at École secondaire Gabriel-Dumont, the Conseil Scolaire Viamonde confirmed. The Thames Valley District School Board has 19 active cases at 16 schools, while the Catholic District School Board reports eight cases at five of its schools. Close contacts of the infected individuals have been notified and are isolating accordingly. All schools remain open.
The London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) is reporting seven patients with COVID-19 in its care, down from eight on Friday. Five or fewer of those patients are listed in intensive care and and none are at Children’s Hospital. The LHSC currently has fewer than five staffers who have tested positive for the virus.
Eighteen more walk-in, pop-up vaccination clinics are planned this week for people who still need either their first or second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. The health unit run clinics are for anyone aged 12 or older. This week’s clinics includes daily vaccination hours at White Oaks Mall in south London and pop-ups at schools in Strathroy, Glencoe, Parkhill, and London. To see the full list of pop-up vaccination clinics in London and Middlesex County click here.
Of the 897 people in the London region who have contracted the virus over the past six weeks, 66.6 per cent were not vaccinated, 12.5 per cent were partially vaccinated, 3.5 per cent had received the vaccine but it had not yet taken effect, and 17.5 per cent were fully vaccinated. The unvaccinated account for 80 percent of local hospitalizations and 66.7 percent of the virus related deaths.
The number of new COVID-19 cases confirmed in Elgin and Oxford counties was 27 on Monday. That number includes infections identified both Saturday and Sunday, as Southwestern Public Health does not update its COVID-19 dashboard on weekends. The latest cases bring the two counties total case count to 4,233. One case was removed from Southwestern Public Health's total case count and shifted to another health unit as part of a data cleanup. There were no additional deaths recorded over the past three days, leaving the death toll unchanged at 85. There are currently no active institutional outbreaks locally. The health unit said the total number of resolved cases in the area is 4,066, leaving 82 known active cases. As of Sunday, 84.5 per cent of all people in the two counties 12 and older have received at least one dose of the vaccine, 78.8 per cent have been given both shots.
Provincially, daily cases fell below 650 for the first time in five days.
Public health officials reported 610 new infections on Monday. That is down from 715 on Sunday, 821 on Saturday, 795 on Friday, and 864 on Thursday.
Of the 610 cases recorded over the past 24 hours, 362 were reportedly among unvaccinated people, 43 involved partially vaccinated people, and 153 were fully vaccinated people. There were 53 COVID-positive individuals whose vaccination status was not known.
Regions with the most new cases Monday were Toronto with 126, Peel Region with 100, York Region with 71, and Ottawa with 54.
The province’s total case count since the start of the pandemic now sits at 580,194.
According to the province’s daily epidemiologic summary, Ontario identified one more case of the B.1.1.7. variant, or Alpha as it is known, since the previous day. There were no additional cases of the P.1 variant, Gamma and the B.1.351 variant, Beta, leaving the totals unchanged at 5,227 and 1,502. There were 23 more cases identified as the B.1.617 (Delta) variant, increasing the total to 16,755.
Two more COVID-19 related deaths were reported over the past 24 hours, increasing the death toll at 9,655. One of the deaths reported on Monday occurred more than a month ago and was just included in the province’s figures as part of a data cleanup.
At hospitals in Ontario, there are 233 patients with COVID-19, down by 12 from Sunday. The total number of patients in the intensive care unit is down by five to 177 and the number of patients on ventilators is down by five to 156.
The number of resolved cases rose by 628 to 564,163. There are currently 6,376 known active cases of the virus in Ontario.
In the last 24 hour period, 23,864 COVID-19 tests were processed. Ontario’s current positivity rate sits at 2.7 per cent.
The province has administered 21,404,362 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, as of Sunday night. Just over 85 per cent of Ontarians 12 and older have received one dose of the vaccine, while almost 78.9 per cent have been given their second dose to be considered fully inoculated. That works out to 10,309,713 people across the province who have received both shots.