This week’s composite chart suggests that the modest decline in Ontario’s rate of new COVID infections noted in last week’s blog may have run its course. If so, we could be on the cusp of the expected holiday-season COVID surge.
Ontario’s positivity rate for PCR COVID tests shows too marginal a rise to draw any meaningful conclusions without first seeing the next week or two of data. Of more concern are the COVID. hospital admissions and ICU occupancy rates, both of which show significant rises over the past two weeks. That said, the actual numbers remain less than half of those for last year at this time.
The more independent statisticians at COVID-19 Resources Canada rate COVID risks as having fallen slightly over the most recent week and Ontario’s as being significantly reduced. This is the first time that I recall Ontario’s risks being among the lowest of the provinces. Their estimate of one in 133 Ontarians being currently infected and therefore infectious remains unchanged.
The chart of currently-circulating COVID variants in our country has not been updated since last week’s because Public Health Canada produces it biweekly and this is the off-week.