Ontario has first case of highly transmissible variant of COVID-19 first discovered in Brazil

News comes as schools will be allowed to reopen across much of southern part of province Monday

TORONTO — Ontario’s first case of a highly transmissible COVID-19 variant that originated in Brazil was discovered in Toronto on Sunday, the day before the province was expected to unveil its plan to emerge from a month-long state of emergency.

The patient, who is now hospitalized, had recently returned from travelling in Brazil, Toronto Public Health said in a news release.

“TPH advises Torontonians to be extremely mindful of time spent outside your household with anyone who doesn’t live with you,” the agency said, noting that there are several concerning variants of the virus that are thought to be more transmissible than the original.

The agency also found its first case of another variant of concern, which first emerged in South Africa. That variant had already been detected in Peel Region, just west of Toronto.

“This case has no recent travel history and has had no known contact with anyone who is a returned traveller,” the public health agency said.

Public health officials have said a third contagious variant — one that first emerged in the U.K. — is far more prevalent in the province than those from Brazil and South Africa.

A single-day snapshot from January found that the variant from the U.K. accounted for 5.5 per cent of all positive COVID-19 cases, and that percentage is expected to rise quickly.

As of last week, the province has been screening all positive cases to see if they can be tied to one of the variants.

As of Sunday, the province had counted 176 confirmed cases of the variant from the U.K., and one of the variant from South Africa, not including Toronto’s new case.

Even so, Premier Doug Ford is set to announce plans Monday to gradually reopen the province from a lockdown and stayat-home order.

A senior government source said four public health regions with low transmission rates are expected to move to the leastrestrictive green category on Wednesday. That excludes the hot spots of Toronto, Peel and York regions, where the stay-athome order will remain in place until the week of Feb. 22 or later.

Also Monday, schools will be allowed to reopen across much of southern Ontario. Schools in Toronto, Peel and York region will remain closed until Feb. 16, he said.

Canada also hit more unwanted firsts in its battle COVID-19 pandemic on Sunday, as Quebec became the first province to surpass 10,000 deaths.

The number comes exactly one week after Canada reported its 20,000th death linked to the pandemic, and a day after the national COVID-19 case count surpassed 800,000.