Waterloo Region adds 17 COVID-19 cases; active infections drop

Waterloo -

Health officials in Waterloo Region logged 17 new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday as the number of active infections declined.

The latest cases bring the region's total to 19,464, including 18,949 resolved infections and 295 deaths.

Active cases dropped by 35 in the past day, down from 251 to 216.

Three of the 17 new cases were among children nine or younger and three were among youth between the ages of 10 and 19.

Since Friday, health partners across the region processed 4,152 COVID-19 tests, bringing the number of completed tests to date to 587,056.

As of Tuesday, Waterloo Region's positivity rate sits at 2.5 per cent and the reproductive rate of the virus is 1.0.

Hospitalizations increased by three in the past 24 hours, up to 10. There are currently four people receiving treatment in area intensive care units.

There are eight active COVID-19 outbreaks across Waterloo Region, unchanged from Monday.

Another 21 infections were confirmed as variant of concern cases in Tuesday's update, all of which were linked to the Delta variant. There have now been 6,230 lab-confirmed variant cases logged in Waterloo Region.

The region's variant breakdown is as follows:

• 3,127 are the Alpha variant, first identified in the United Kingdom and originally known as B.1.1.7
• 21 are the Beta variant, originally detected in South Africa and previously referred to as B.1.315
• 98 are the Gamma variant, initially discovered in Brazil and labelled as P.1
• 2,721 are the Delta variant, first found in India and previously called B.1.617
• 263 cases have had a mutation detected, but have not yet had a variant strain confirmed

Meanwhile, health partners administered 1,083 COVID-19 vaccine doses on Monday, bringing the total number of jabs put into arms to 849,102.

More than 82.1 per cent of the eligible population is fully vaccinated and 88.12 per cent of residents 12 and older have received at least one dose.

Among Waterloo Region's entire population, 70.77 per cent are fully vaccinated and 75.88 per cent have received at least one dose.

Ontario health officials reported 574 new COVID-19 cases province-wide on Tuesday. Of the new cases, 434 were among people are unvaccinated, not fully vaccinated or have an unknown vaccination status and 140 are in fully vaccinated individuals.

The province has now confirmed 9,663 COVID-19-related deaths and 580,768 cases since the pandemic began.

With files from CTV Toronto.