Official statistics made available this past week again indicate a modest but continuing uptick in new COVID infections. 

As you can see in our composite chart, Ontario municipal wastewater PCR test results have been showing that gradual but unbroken rise since late March to a level slightly higher than last year at this time, when they were declining. Actual human PCR test results have shown sharper rise, with the most recent week also higher than this time last year. COVID hospitalizations show a similar trend, though they remain just below last year and ICU admissions have not yet followed suit. 

The more independent COVID-19 Resources Canada Hazard Index was not updated this past week. Its last estimate was one in 76 Ontarians being currently COVID-infected and hence infectious. 

The most recent Public Health Canada report on circulating COVID strains (for the week of May 5 to 11) graphically illustrates the dominance of the JN.1 family of variants, which accounts for 95% of all new Canadian infections. That lineage continues to differentiate at a mild-blowing rate, with the latest KP.2 and KP.3 strains having far outcompeted the JN.1 parental strain to the point of accounting for more than half of all COVID infections. As we reported last week, the WHO considers the JN.1 family sufficiently different from the XBB strains for which the current vaccine booster was formulated as to require a reformulation.