Ontario reports fewest number of ventilated COVID-19 patients in 20 months

Ontario reported 10 net new COVID-19 deaths on Thursday, as the number of patients breathing with the help of a ventilator fell to its lowest point since the month the province first instituted a mask mandate.

The Ministry of Health said seven of the deaths occurred in the past 30 days and three others occurred prior to that period.

One death involved a resident of long-term care.

There have been 49 deaths in the past seven days, 342 in the past 30 days and 13,314 overall.

Hospitals reported 549 admitted patients testing positive for COVID-19, up 27 from Wednesday but down 121 from this point last week.

Of those, 118 were in intensive care, up four from Wednesday but down one from this point last week.

Forty-four patients were breathing with the help of a ventilator, the lowest overall population of vented COVID-19 patients seen in the province since Oct. 19, 2020.

On Wednesday, Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Kieran Moore said the mask mandate for public transit property and hospitals would expire on June 11.

Ontario first instituted a mask mandate in indoor public spaces on Oct. 2, 2020.

A variety of hospitals said they would continue to require masks beyond that date.

UHN infectious disease specialist Dr. Isaac Bogoch said the public should understand that there may be a future re-introduction of mask rules if conditions worsen, particularly this fall.

“There’s going to be peaks and valleys of COVID-19, we’re expecting to see a rise in cases in the fall and in the winter, and you might expect recommendations to change at that time when other settings might ask people to put masks back on,” he told CP24.

Ontario’s positive trend is continuing, the Science Advisory Table says, citing wastewater surveillance data showing declining viral signal in all regions of the province.

Of the 907 cases confirmed Thursday through PCR testing, 87 involved unvaccinated or partially vaccinated people, 141 involved people with two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, 541 involved people with three or more doses and the vaccination status of 138 others was not known.

Provincial labs processed 9,777 test specimens in the previous 24-hour period, generating a positivity rate of 6.6 per cent.

Average weekly positivity has fallen from 8.3 per cent last week to 7.1 per cent this week.

The Ministry of Health says 13,556 COVID-19 vaccine doses were administered on Wednesday.

Of those, 807 were first doses, 985 were second doses, 1,608 were third doses and 10,156 were fourth doses.

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.