Ontario reports 412 more cases of COVID-19, 68 deaths, and completed more tests than yesterday

TORONTO, ON., May 6, 2020 — Today, Ontario public health officials reported 412 new COVID-19 infections up 25 from yesterday’s report, but still lower than last week’s numbers. Sadly the province also reported 68 deaths, seven more than yesterday’s death count. Ontario’s total case count including recoveries has now risen to 18,722 while the total number of Ontarians who have lost their lives to COVID-19 is now 1,429. There have been 13,222 recoveries.

Although the number of reported cases of COVID-19 has increased over the past two days, this week’s seven-day numbers are 347, 421, 511, 434, 370, 387 and 412 respectively, whereas just over a week ago the province was reporting between 500 and 640 cases.

“We are in a very slow plateau and we hope to get even further progression,” said Dr. David Williams, Ontario’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, on Wednesday at the province’s daily COVID-19 news conference.

Province conducted 2,307 more tests than previous day, almost 4,500 fewer than weekend numbers

Although the province had been testing a larger volume of patients and as much as 16,500 Friday, and 16,305 on Saturday, test numbers dipped to 14,555 Sunday and then dropped dramatically Tuesday to 10,654. Today, the province completed 12,961 tests which is 2,307 more than the previous day.

Premier Doug Ford spoke out critically yesterday towards local medical officers of health for failing to test enough people for COVID-19. He blamed them for slacking. “Start picking up your socks and doing testing,” said Ford. “I don’t know what the big problems is with testing. It is frustrating as anything.” Today, Premier Ford clarified that he was referring specifically to long-term care home testing where because they have been lagging behind, local public health units have been asked to help out with testing.

“They do have a responsibility to coordinate the testing and maybe we will make it very clear when the province puts down a provincial order to get everyone tested, we mean it,” said Ford. “Get everyone tested in long-term care,” he said. 

Long-term care homes report 37 more deaths

And there is good reason to stress the need to improve testing at long-term care facilities because sadly 752 of the province’s 1,429 deaths have occurred at long-term care centres and retirement homes. There were 44 more deaths reported yesterday. Also, a staggering 1,000 out of the 1,400 deaths have occurred in people over 80 with an additional 359 deaths reported in ages 60 to 79. Five staff members at long-term care centres have also lost their lives due to the virus. The total number of active cases in the care and retirement homes is 3,082 along with 1,571 staff members. 223 outbreaks, five more than yesterday have been reported in long-term care homes.

Hospitals have also reported 271 staff cases of COVID-19 which is three more since yesterday. There have also been two more deaths amongst hospital staff raising the death toll to 40. There now have been 69 outbreaks in Ontario hospitals, which is up three from yesterday.

Some encouraging news according to hospital stats provided by the Ontario Ministry of Health from May 6 as of 10:30 am, the number of hospitalized patients in Ontario due to the virus has dropped by nine lowering the total to 1,032. Meanwhile, the number of patients in ICU has dropped by six to 225 patients in ICUs. Today, there are also 174 patients currently on ventilators, which has dropped dramatically by 49 since yesterday. Also of note, 3,013 of the total 18,722 cases are healthcare workers.

Ontario daily COVID-19 case counts past 16 days

If you take a look at the numbers over the past 14 days you will see that this past week saw an average of 373 new cases a day while the previous 7 days the daily average was 520.

April 20 – 606, April 21 – 551, April 22 – 510, April 23 – 634, April 24 – 640, April 25 – 476, April 26 – 437, April 27 – 424, April 28 – 525, April 29 – 347, April 30 – 459, May 1 – 421, May 2 – 511, May 3 – 434, May 4 – 370, May 5 – 387, May 6 – 412

Greater Toronto Area and Toronto COVID-19 case numbers

Greater Toronto Area public health units now account for 60.6% of cases, and 12.2% are hospitalized. of which 6,665 exist in Toronto, 2,628 in Peel, 481 in Halton, 1,087 in Durham, and 1,657 in York.

Meanwhile as of 3:45 pm today, Toronto Public Health says there were 227 more cases reported. Toronto now has 6,019 confirmed cases and 646 probable ones. There are currently 391 people in hospital and 99 in intensive care units. Sadly, in total, 604 Torontonians have lost their lives to this coronavirus.

Toronto’s Medical Officer of Health, Dr. Eileen de Villa said today that “Last week we started to see the number of new COVID-19 cases in Toronto slowly decrease. This is promising news and brings me hope. While you may think that washing your hands and practising physical distancing are small efforts on the global scale of the challenge we are facing, these measures are exactly what is needed to win this battle.”

The World Health Organization has urged wherever feasible to consider walking or biking when moving around during the COVID-19 outbreak. These modes of active transportation not only provide physical distancing, but can significantly reduce our risk of chronic diseases and improve our mental health.

“So please do continue to stay safe, please continue to practise physical distancing when you go outside, and please continue to take care of each other,” said Dr. de Villa.

This report includes the most current information available from the integrated Public Health
Information System (iPHIS) as of 4 p.m. May 5, 2020, from the Toronto Public Health Coronavirus Rapid Entry System (CORES) and the Ottawa Public Health COVID-19 Ottawa Database (The COD) as of 2 p.m. May 5, 2020.

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