Waterloo Region adds 26 new COVID-19 cases as hospitalizations spike significantly

Waterloo -

Health officials in Waterloo Region confirmed 26 new COVID-19 cases in Friday's update as local hospitalizations rose significantly.

The number of people in hospital with the disease soared by seven in the past 24 hours, now up to 17. Intensive care unit admissions also rose from nine to 12.

The Region of Waterloo only counts active, infectious patients in hospitalization numbers, but counts both active and resolved cases in ICU figures. This means ICU numbers can sometimes be higher than hospitalizations.

The 26 latest cases bring Waterloo Region's total caseload to 18,620, including 18,182 resolved infections, 286 deaths and 147 active cases.

Among the new infections reported, six are in youth 19 and younger.

There are currently eight active COVID-19 outbreaks across the region.

Health officials have now completed 553,431 COVID-19 tests since the pandemic began. As of Friday, Waterloo Region's positivity rate sits at 2.3 per cent and the reproductive rate of the virus is 1.0.

Another 31 infections were confirmed as variant of concern cases in Friday's update, with most linked to the Delta variant.

Waterloo Region's variant breakdown is as follows:

• 3,123 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
• 1,398 are the Delta variant, first found in India and previously called B.1.617
• 268 cases have had a mutation detected, but have not yet had a variant strain confirmed

Meanwhile, the region hit a major milestone in the vaccine rollout on Friday, with 75 per cent of the eligible population now fully vaccinated.

More than 84 per cent of residents 12 and older have received at least one dose.

Health partners have administered 794,752 COVID-19 vaccine doses to date, with 2,381 jabs put into arms on Thursday.

Province-wide, another 510 COVID-19 cases were confirmed in Friday's report, marking the second day in a row with daily case counts of more than 500.

Of the 510 cases confirmed, 368 are in unvaccinated people and 57 are in partially vaccinated individuals, Health Minister Christine Elliott said in a tweet.

The rolling seven-day average now stands at 399, a major jump from 214 at this time last week.

Ontario has now logged 554,472 COVID-19 cases and 9,416 deaths since the pandemic began.

With files from CTV Toronto.