Ontario has reached a grim milestone in the coronavirus pandemic. The province has now surpassed 1 million cases of COVID-19 and more than 11,000 related deaths.
The record case counts come as health officials said the number of people in Ontario’s hospitals with COVID-19 continues to increase. As of Monday there were more than 3,860 being treated in hospitals, with more than 600 of them in ICUs — also an increase.
The numbers could be even higher as hospitals do not report patient numbers on the weekends. Public health officials said the numbers reported are an underestimate of the true data.
"The death rate is very high, right now, still, in comparison to the number of sick individuals," said Dr. Dale Kalina, an infectious disease physician at the Joseph Brant hospital in Burlington. "No, it’s a far lower amount, but the gross number itself is still high because the number of people that got infected, particularly in this most recent wave, is humongous.”
As for vaccines, the province is reporting that almost 90% of Ontarians have had two doses. It’s not clear how many of the cases in hospitals are of unvaccinated people.
Kalina said the numbers, especially of those who die from COVID-19, will likely continue to rise this week. Most of the new case numbers were in Toronto, as well as regions to the east and west of the city.
