KITCHENER

Waterloo Region reports 63 more cases of COVID-19 on Monday

Chase Banger CTVNewsKitchener.ca Digital Content Producer

Published Monday, November 23, 2020 2:02PM EST

Katie Kempton, a laboratory technologist at LifeLabs, demonstrates one of the steps taken when a specimen is tested for COVID-19 at the company's lab, in Surrey, B.C., on March 26, 2020. (CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck)

Text:

KITCHENER -- Waterloo Region saw its total number of COVID-19 cases grow by 63 on Monday after more than 100 new ones were reported over the weekend.

The latest update brings the region's total to 3,082, a number that includes 2,596 resolved cases. There are still 363 active cases.

After an update on Monday, the region's online COVID-19 dashboard no longer shows how many deaths there are, but removing the resolved and active case numbers from the total leaves 123, the same number of fatalities that officials reported on Sunday.

The region's dashboard showed that there are currently 16 people in hospital with COVID-19, a number that includes 11 people who are being cared for in an intensive care unit.

The number of active outbreaks in the region also dropped to 21 from 24 on Monday, though officials did declare a new outbreak at Centennial Public School.

In that case, a staff member had been at the school while infectious and awaiting test results. Since, two students have had lab-confirmed cases of COVID-19.

The region's dashboard shows that the number of cases in young people has been steadily climbing. Back on Sept. 5, there were only 21 cases in kids nine and younger. That number has since risen to 91. In the next age demographic—those aged 10 to 19—the number of cases rose from 45 to 252 in the same span of time.

NEW DATA REPORTING

The updated dashboard now shares more data related to COVID-19, including a seven-day moving average percentage of tests that are turned around in one day.

At the end of October, the number was 59.2 per cent – the latest data shows just 37 per cent of tests are reaching that objective. More than three quarters of tests are turned around in two days or sooner.

The new "monitoring" page on the dashboard also shows the seven-day moving average of tests per 100,000 people. In the past two weeks, the number has hovered between 215 and 183.

To date, the region's testing partners have collected more than 32,000 tests per 100,000 people.

Nearly 200,000 tests have been done in Waterloo Region since the pandemic began, though that number includes instances of re-testing on the same person.