Ontario reports more than 4,000 COVID-19 cases, 28 additional deaths

Ontario is reporting 4,156 new COVID-19 cases and 28 additional deaths on Wednesday.

Locally, there are 1,254 new cases in Toronto, 593 in Peel, 476 in York Region, 340 in Ottawa and 248 in Durham.

There were 54,211 tests completed in the last 24 hour period, up from the more than 42,000 completed a day ago. Testing numbers are typically down earlier in the week.

The province reports a test positivity rate of 8.6 per cent, down from 10.3 a day ago but up from 6.7 per cent on the same day last week.

Tuesday’s positivity rate was the highest province reported since the start of the pandemic. The previous high of 9.7 per cent came on two days, Dec. 29 and Jan. 4, during the peak of the second wave.

The province reported 3,670 cases and 15 deaths on Tuesday.

The rolling seven-day average of cases is up to 4,002. That number is up more than 1,000 cases from one week ago and it is the highest seven-day average ever.

There are now 1,877 people hospitalized in the province due to COVID-19 with 642 in the ICU. It is the highest number of hospitalizations since the start of the pandemic and another record-high for ICU patients.

According to the latest provincial numbers, there are 3,980 additional cases of the B.1.1.7 variant.

There are now 24,467 cumulative cases of the B.1.1.7 variant, 176 cases of the P.1 variant first detected in Brazil and 84 cases of the B.1.351 variant first detected in South Africa.

There were 95,692 vaccine doses administered in the last 24 hour period.

There were 112,817 vaccine doses administered in the last 24 hour period, a new single-day record for daily doses.

As of 8:00 p.m. Monday, 3,422,974 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine have been administered in the province.

Ontario has announced the first pop-up clinic that will be made available to vaccinate around 15,000 people aged 18-and-up over the next several weeks.

The pop-up clinic is located in North Etobicoke at BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir and will run in collaboration with BAPS Charities, Toronto Public Health, and the William Osler Health System.

The site began administering doses on April 14.

The Ontario College of Family Physicians has confirmed 300 family medical practices across the province are being onboarded to put more shots in arms in hot spot areas.

Through a pilot project last month, some family doctors in six public health units, including Toronto and Peel Region, began administering the AstraZeneca shot.

The NDP is calling for the auditor general to investigate how the Ford government chose certain postal code zones as COVID-19 hot spots.

The request comes after a report earlier this week that revealed five of the designated hot spots actually have rates of COVID-19 cases, hospitalization and death that are lower than the provincial average.

RELATED: Details on what Ontario’s hot-spot vaccination plan looks like

COVID-19 in schools

Premier Doug Ford announced on Monday that the province will keep all schools in Ontario closed to in-person learning indefinitely following the current school break.

Elementary and secondary schools in the province are to move to teacher-led remote learning when students return from the break on April 19.