Ontario reports fewest new COVID-19 cases in more than 10 months

Ontario is reporting 114 new COVID-19 cases and no deaths on Monday.

It is the smallest daily increase of new infections the province has seen since Sept. 1.

The test positivity rate is 0.9 per cent, down from 1.3 per cent one week ago.

There were nearly 15,933 tests completed in the last 24-hour period.

Locally, there are 18 new cases in Grey Bruce, 15 in the Region of Waterloo and 10 in Toronto.

There were another 96 resolved cases, It is the first time in 11 days that new infections have outnumbered resolved cases.

The rolling seven-day average has dropped to 184, reaching the lowest point since Sept. 11.

The province reported 166 new cases and six deaths on Sunday.

There are now 204 people in the ICU with COVID-19 complications and 123 ICU patients on a ventilator. The ventilator numbers have dropped to the lowest since mid-November.

There were 121,653 COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the last 24-hour period.

As of 8 p.m. Sunday, 17,119,624 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered across the province – 78.5 per cent of Ontario residents 12 and older have received at least one dose while 53.9 per cent are now fully vaccinated.

Ontario has now administered over 17 million doses of the COVID-19 vaccine.

Toronto reached another vaccine milestone with 60 per cent of adults now fully vaccinated.

As part of Team Toronto’s Home Stretch vaccine push, the city has launched more than 20 micro-focused immunization clinics in six priority neighbourhoods in the city’s northwest.

The northwest part of the city is experiencing some of the lowest overall vaccination rates for both first and second doses, at 59 per cent and 36 per cent respectively.

Ontario will enter Step 3 of the province’s economic reopening plan ahead of schedule on Friday which will see indoor dining resume and allow for gyms and movie theatres to reopen.

There will be no capacity or table limits for indoor dining when the move is made – but social distancing rules will remain in place and masks will remain mandatory.

Outdoor social gatherings and organized public events with up to 100 people will be allowed as well as indoor social gatherings and organized public events with up to 25 people.

The province has passed its COVID-19 vaccination target for entering Step 3, with 78 per cent of adults vaccinated with one dose and more than 50 per cent fully vaccinated as of Thursday.

Canada is expecting vaccine shipments to keep rolling in this week as the country inches closer to matching the percentage of people in the United States fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

The federal government expects another 1.4 million doses of the shot from Pfizer-BioNTech to arrive in the next seven days.

By the end of the week, Canadian officials expect to have received a total of more than 55 million doses including the latest shipments, though those figures may change.