COVID-19 will strain Ontario’s health system

‘Key indicators of the pandemic continue to worsen’

New projections suggest Ontario’s surging COVID-19 caseload is likely to strain its healthcare system to the point where surgeries will be cancelled and Quebec’s premier is raising the possibility of school closures around the holidays.

Those were two major developments Thursday as the situation with the stubborn pandemic darkened on several fronts across Canada.

“Key indicators of the pandemic continue to worsen,” said Dr. Adalsteinn Brown, cochair of Ontario’s COVID -19 science advisory table.

The latest modelling suggests that a five per cent virus growth rate, which Brown called a “slightly optimistic” scenario, wwould put Ontario on track for 66,500 new cases a day by mid- December. Under a three per cent growth rate, it would be 2,500 cases daily.

Just two weeks ago, it had been predicted that new daily infections would hold steady between 800 and 1,200 for a while.

Ontario reported a recordbreaking 1,575 new infections Thursday, along with 18 more deaths.

Brown said that under any of the t latest projected ti scenarios, n tens ive care occupancy wwould exceed thew key threshold of 150 beds across the province.

“It’s that point at which we need to start cancelling planned surgeries and we can no longer deliver the full slate of a planned care right now,” he said.

Quebec reported 1,365 new COVID-19 cases and 42 more deaths, including nine in 24 hours.

Premier Francois Legault said he was considering temporarily closing schools. Legault said 1,174 classrooms across the province are currently closed, but most alarming was that 324 of them had been shut in the last two days.

“It remains the last solution, but currently, when one looks at the situation, we should not exclude any solution,” he said in Quebec City.

In Manitoba, the province entered the first day of widespread restrictions meant to stem steadily increasing cases.