TORONTO – 3,220 people in hospital with Covid-19 (compared to 2,467 yesterday) and 80 new hospitalizations in intensive care in one day: and they are partial data, because over 10% of hospitals did not report their data during the end week. 

Hospitalizations in Ontario continue to grow and also affect children: 61 of those aged between 0 and 4 were hospitalized with the virus, with the highest Covid-19 hospitalization rate among patients under the age of 60.

Of the people currently hospitalized with the virus, 465 – the data refers to 10 January – are in intensive care (the day before they were 438, a week ago 266) and, we said, today there was also a record of 80 adults ended up in the ICU, marking a record of day-to-day ICU admissions since the start of the pandemic, according to Critical Care Services Ontario data provided by the Ontario Health Association (OHA).

The Ontario Ministry of Health, Christine Elliott, however, pointed out that only 54% of hospitalized patients who tested positive for Covid-19 were hospitalized for the treatment of the symptoms of the virus, while 46% were hospitalized for a different medical problem and tested positive for coronavirus upon admission to the hospital. As for intensive care, on the other hand, 83% of Covid-19 patients are treated mainly for coronavirus infection, while 17% ended up in intensive care and accidentally tested positive for the virus.

Another 21 deaths were also recorded today, bringing the total death toll in Ontario, since the beginning of the pandemic, to 10,399. Instead, 9,893 people recovered from the virus in the last 24 hours.

As for the count of cases, 7,951 were recorded today, down from 9,076 the day before and 11,352 a week ago, but it is a figure, as we have explained in previous editions, totally unreliable due to the limitations of Covid-test only to the categories considered “at risk”. The provincial laboratories today in fact processed only 45,451 tests: the positivity rate remains high, however, at 24.4%, and the moving average of the daily rate calculated over seven days is 27.6% (slightly down: one week ago was 30.9%).

The cases currently active in Ontario are 138,560 but even this could be just the tip of the iceberg, for the same reasons just illustrated.

On the vaccination front, so far over 87% of Ontarians aged five and over have received one dose of the vaccine, 82% two and 35% three.

In the pic, the graphic published yesterday on the Ontario Hospital Association’s Twitter profile (@OntHospitalAssn)