Ontario records fewer than 100 new COVID-19 cases for first time in four months

TORONTO -- Ontario has recorded fewer than 100 new cases of COVID-19 for the first time since the end of March.

Provincial health officials logged 76 new infections of the novel coronavirus on Wednesday.

The new patients confirmed on Wednesday mark a significant decrease in Ontario, as the province has seen daily case counts climb as high as 203 and fall as low as 103 within the past 10 days.

There were 85 cases confirmed on March 24, which was the last day there were fewer than 100 new infections confirmed in the province.

Wednesday's case count is the lowest day-over-day increase since March 22 when 48 cases were confirmed.

Ontario hit its COVID-19 peak period in late April. The highest number of new patients confirmed in one day in the province was 640 on April 24.

The total case count in Ontario is now 38,986.

One additional death was confirmed in Ontario on Wednesday. The province’s death toll is now 2,769.

There are currently 91 patients infected with the disease in Ontario hospitals. Of those patients, 28 are being treated in the intensive care unit and 17 of those are breathing with the assistance of a ventilator.

The number of recovered patients in Ontario is now 34,741.

Where are the new COVID-19 cases?

Twenty-eight of Ontario’s 34 local public health units reported five or fewer cases of the novel coronavirus on Wednesday.

According to Wednesday’s epidemiological summary, there are 22 new infections in Windsor-Essex, 13 in Niagara, 13 in Ottawa, 10 in Chatham-Kent and nine in York Region.

On Wednesday morning, the Ontario government announced that Toronto and Peel Region will move ahead to Stage 3 of the province’s reopening plan on Friday.

Toronto recorded one new case of COVID-19 on Wednesday and Peel Region confirmed four.

Windsor-Essex will now be the only region in Ontario remaining in Stage 2.

Today, we announced that Toronto and Peel regions will move into Stage 3 on Friday at 12:01 a.m. I’d also like to acknowledge the considerable and ongoing work by Windsor-Essex public health officials to contain the virus locally. You have our full support.

— Christine Elliott (@celliottability) July 29, 2020

COVID-19 testing in Ontario

More than 2.1 million COVID-19 tests have been conducted in Ontario since the start of the pandemic.

In the last 24 hours, more than 27,000 tests were conducted.

Recently, the province has been hitting its daily testing goal of 20,000, but back in March, when case counts were this low, testing capacity was limited to about 2,500 per day.

There are currently 18,268 tests under investigation in the province.