Following two consecutive days of decreases, COVID-19 hospitalizations in the London area rose slightly on Friday.
The London Health Sciences Centre (LHSC) confirmed 42 inpatients with the virus remain in its care, an increase of three since Thursday. The hospital network noted 24 of the 42 infected inpatients were admitted for treatment of the virus. The 18 others came to the hospital for other reasons and tested positive for the virus.
The LHSC has five or fewer patients with COVID listed in intensive care, unchanged over the past 24 hours. Children’s Hospital has five or fewer inpatients with the virus, with five or fewer of those inpatients listed in paediatric critical care.
The number of infected hospital workers went up by one since Thursday. The LHSC said there are currently 170 employees who have tested positive. At this time last week, there were 215 infected workers.
Another 71 new COVID-19 cases were confirmed on Friday by the Middlesex London Health Unit, up from 67 the previous day. The health unit continues to note that single-day case counts are likely an underestimate of the true number of people in the region with the virus, due to limited testing eligibility.
The total number of confirmed infections in the region since the pandemic began is now 37,265.
The health unit said there were no additional deaths linked to the virus on Friday. So far this month, there have been two deaths linked to the virus in the city and county - a man in his 90s on Tuesday and a woman in her 70s on Thursday. A death that occurred previously was added to the official count as part of a data clean up on Friday. It brings the local death toll to 378.
The number of resolved cases rose to 36,186. There are 705 known active cases in the region, down 10 over the past 24 hours.
In Elgin and Oxford counties, there were 62 new COVID-19 cases reported Friday. Southwestern Public Health, the health unit for the region, said that brings the local total number of cases to 13,521 with 13,002 resolved. The COVID-19 death toll locally increased by two to 164. There are currently 355 known active cases in the two counties.
The number of COVID-19 positive Ontarians admitted to intensive care went up again on Friday.
There are currently 1,662 COVID-19 positive people in hospitals in Ontario, down 14 since Thursday. At this time last week, 1,679 hospitalizations were reported across the province.
Of the 1,662 people in hospital Friday, roughly 43 per cent were admitted because of the virus, while 57 per cent were admitted for other reasons and tested positive for the virus.
In intensive care units, there are 210 patients with COVID-19, up five from Thursday.
Ontario logged 2,418 new cases of COVID-19 on Friday. Public health officials have cautioned the daily counts are an underestimate of the spread of the virus in the province due to limited PCR testing eligibility.
Ontario’s total case count since the start of the pandemic now stands at 1,270,808.
Public health officials confirmed 17 additional deaths over the past 24 hours, pushing the death toll up to 12,938. The province said all of the 17 deaths occurred within the last month.
The number of resolved cases are up by 3,086 to 1,232,482.
In the last 24 hour period, 17,744 COVID-19 tests were processed. Ontario’s positivity rate is now 13.8 per cent, up from 13.2 per cent a week ago.
To date, the province has administered 32,894,669 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, with 91.2 per cent of people 12 and older having received two shots. More than 7.3 million Ontarians have received a booster shot.