TORONTO -- COVID-19 infections in Ontario have climbed back up past 2,000 following two days of case numbers reported under that mark.
The 2,400 cases logged Thursday represent a significant increase over the 1,588 added a day earlier.
With 45,406 tests processed across the province in the past 24 hours, the Ministry of Health says the COVID-19 positivity rate is 5.2 per cent.
Since the beginning of the pandemic, Ontario has recorded 517,090 lab-confirmed cases of the disease. That number includes 485,512 recoveries and 8,552 deaths.
At least 27 of those deaths were reported in the previous day.
The seven-day average for number of cases reported is 2,131. A week ago, the average was 2,730.
Right now, there are 23,026 active cases of the novel coronavirus in Ontario.
Meanwhile, 1,320 COVID-19 patients remain in hospital, 721 of which are being treated in intensive care.
Where are the new COVID-19 cases?
Most of the cases reported by the province Thursday were found in Toronto (607), Peel Region (528), and Hamilton (224).
Case numbers in the triple digits were also found in York Region (181) and Durham Region (110).
Ontario is currently under a stay-at-home order which was recently extended and is set to expire on June 2.
On Thursday afternoon, Premier Doug Ford unveiled a three-step reopening plan to ease pandemic restrictions which is set to begin on June 14, starting with outdoor activities.
Update on COVID-19 variants of concern
Another 1,810 cases of the COVID-19 variant known as B.1.1.7 were confirmed in Ontario since Wednesday.
The case total for the mutation, which was first discovered in the U.K., stands at 114,569.
Thirty cases of P.1 (Brazilian variant) and one case of B.1.351 (South African variant) were also recorded, pushing their case totals to 2,089 and 684, respectively.
The province dose not publicly report the number of B.1.617 (Indian variant) infections.
COVID-19 vaccinations in Ontario
More than 7.5 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine have been administered across Ontario so far.
At least 144,000 of those needles went into arms on Wednesday alone.
The Ministry of Health says that nearly 474,000 people have received both a first and second dose and are considered to be fully vaccinated against the disease.
Backstory:
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.
