TORONTO -- Ontario health officials confirmed 118 new COVID-19 cases and a slight increase in the number of people who have died due to the disease.

Officials reported nine new COVID-19 related deaths on Wednesday. At the start of the week, the province recorded zero deaths for the first time in months and two more people died on Tuesday.

Since late March, thousands of people have died due to the novel coronavirus. During the peak period, the province saw dozens of people die each day.

Officials noted that Wednesday’s number is a very slight increase from the 112 reported on Tuesday, but that the numbers are “largely stable.”

“Ontario is reporting 118 new cases of COVID-19 today, a 0.3 per cent increase and largely stable from yesterday’s numbers,” Ontario Health Minister Christine Elliott stated on Wednesday.

The recent infections bring Ontario’s total number of lab-confirmed cases of the disease to 36,178, including 2,700 deaths and 31,805 recoveries.

Where are the COVID-19 cases?

Elliott said that 30 of the province’s 34 public health units have reported five or fewer new cases of the disease on Wednesday, with 18 of them reporting no new cases at all.

According to Wednesday’s epidemiology report, 27 of the new cases were found in Peel Region, 13 were found in York Region, 50 were found in Toronto, and four were found in Windsor-Essex, a region that has grappled with outbreaks among migrant workers.

Of the new cases in Ontario, 69 are between the ages of 20 and 59. There are 13 patients who are 19 years old or younger and 36 patients who are over the age of 59.

The majority of total deaths to date have been reported in people over the age of 70. One person, under the age of 19, who had COVID-19 died in Ontario, but it is not clear if the death was caused by the disease or other health issues.

Eleven patients who died were between the ages of 20 and 39, while 109 were between the ages of 40 and 59 and 718 were between the ages of 60 and 79.

More than 1,800 people over the age of 80 have died of the disease, many of whom lived in long-term care homes.

As of Wednesday, there were 123 people in the hospital due to COVID-19. Thirty-five of those patients are in the intensive care unit and 26 of them are breathing with the assistance of ventilators.

COVID-19 testing in Ontario

In the last 24 hours, just over 22,000 COVID-19 tests were conducted by officials.

Ontario health officials have conducted more than 1.5 million tests for the disease since the pandemic was declared.

More than 17,000 tests are still under investigation.