Ontario records 148 new COVID-19 cases, nearly half are in Peel Region

TORONTO -- Ontario is seeing another daily COVID-19 case count surpass 100 and nearly half of the new infections are in one region.

On Friday, provincial health officials logged 148 new patients infected with the novel coronavirus.

Of those patients, 72 are in Peel Region, 41 are in Toronto and 13 are in Ottawa.

The 72 new infections reported in Peel Region on Friday is the highest single-day tally recorded in that area since June 4. The region had seen its daily case counts fall to the low teens as recently as early August, but since then they have been recording a steady increase with their rolling seven-day average now at 36.

Speaking at his daily news conference held on Friday afternoon, Premier Doug Ford called the rise in cases in Peel Region, specifically in Brampton, a real concern.

“When Brampton makes up three per cent of the population but 40 per cent of the cases yesterday that is concerning and I keep seeing this escalating,” Ford said.

The premier said he is trying to reach out to the city’s mayor, Patrick Brown, to see what can be done to assist in the situation.

The other 31 local public health units across Ontario reported five or fewer cases of COVID-19 on Friday, with 12 of them reporting none at all.

Ontario’s daily case count has hovered above the 100 mark for majority of the past two weeks. The last time the province dipped into double digits was on Aug. 26 and before that it was on Aug. 20.

The new patients logged on Friday bring Ontario’s total case count to 42,834, including deaths and recoveries.

There were no new deaths linked to COVID-19 recorded by the province on Friday, but health officials did retract one deceased patient from Ontario’s death toll, which is now 2,811.

Health officials deemed 116 more novel coronavirus cases to be resolved in the province as of Friday. Ontario’s total number of recovered patients is now 38,741.

There are now 1,282 active cases in the province.

As of Friday, 66 COVID-19 patients are in Ontario hospitals. Thirteen of those patients are in the intensive care unit and eight of those patients are breathing with the assistance of a ventilator.

Since the start of the pandemic, more than three million COVID-19 tests have been conducted in Ontario.

In the last recorded 24-hour period, 28,591 tests were conducted.

There are currently 25,945 tests under investigation in the province.