Ontario reports approximately 35 per cent week-over-week decline in COVID-19 hospitalizations

Ontario is reporting an approximately 35 per cent week-over-week drop in COVID-19 hospitalizations as the pressure on the health-care system continues to ease.

The Ministry of Health says that there are now 526 people in hospital with COVID-19, including 114 people in intensive care.

That is compared to the 808 COVID-19 patients that were in hospital at this time last week, including 140 in intensive care.

Of those people, 78 are breathing with the assistance of a ventilator.

COVID-19 hospitalizations in Ontario have been trending down for weeks now after a sixth wave peak of 1,730 was reached in late April.

A number of epidemiologists and public health experts have said that transmission will likely remain low through the summer months, but could begin to rise again in the fall as more people head indoors.

Against this backdrop, other public health indicators like positivity rates and case counts are also continuing to decrease and are now at levels not seen in months.

Over the last 24 hours, 7.2 per cent of all PCR tests have come back positive. That is compared to 8.3 per cent at this time last week and 9.1 per cent two weeks ago.

The latest data also points to a decrease in the handful of settings with widespread access to PCR testing.

There are now 74 active outbreaks at long-term care homes, 39 in retirement homes and 25 in hospitals.

That is compared to 115, 60 and 35 respectively last week.

Meanwhile, Ontario’s death toll continues to rise as the most lagging indicator of COVID-19 transmission.

On Tuesday the ministry added four net new deaths to its COVID-19 tally, which now stands at 13,293.

It has added 52 net new deaths to the tally since this time last week.

The numbers used in this story are found in the Ontario Ministry of Health's COVID-19 Daily Epidemiologic Summary. The number of cases for any city or region may differ slightly from what is reported by the province, because local units report figures at different times.