State of COVID in Hamilton worsens with 247 cases reported in one day
City hospitals have the most patients fighting virus yet, as two more local people die
Many of Hamilton’s Friday COVID-19 metrics were the worst the city has ever seen.
They came as the provincial government announced the strictest COVID-19 restrictions the province implemented to date. The restrictions include checkpoints at Ontario’s provincial borders, enhanced powers given to bylaw and police officers and closing playgrounds. They come into effect first thing Saturday.
Among the record-setting metrics in Hamilton on Friday:
247 new cases in one day is the highest in pandemic for single-day update — by a
long shot;
á 120 COVID patients in Hamilton hospitals is the most throughout the pandemic;
á 196 cases per 100,000 population weekly (Spectator’s calculations) is highest in pandemic;
á 1,309 active cases is the highest since Jan. 10; á 5.6 per cent positivity rate is the second highest ever, with the highest being 6.0 per cent during the week of Jan. 7 being the highest;
The city has only exceeded 200 cases in one day twice — 201 on Wednesday and 209 in January.
Ontario also broke a daily record Friday, with 4,812 new cases reported.
In Hamilton, public health reported two more people died with COVID. One person was in their 70s and the other was in their 60s. A total of 343 Hamiltonians have died throughout the pandemic.
The city is about to hit 15,000 cumulative cases, with the new Friday cases bringing us to 14,985 cases recorded throughout the pandemic. Of those, 87 per cent are now resolved.
The per cent positivity is now 5.6 in Hamilton, meaning 5.6 per cent of all COVID tests from the last seven days are coming back positive.
Hamilton ICUs are near capacity, with St. Joseph’s Healthcare at 97 per cent capacity and Hamilton Health Sciences at 94 per cent, with 102 beds occupied out of a total of 108.
“We’re losing the battle,” Premier Doug Ford said at a news conference Friday afternoon.
Ford announced a slew of new measures his government believes will combat the rapid spread of COVID-19, which has been bolstered by fasterspreading and more deadly variants. The new measures include: a ban on outdoor gatherings with anyone outside your household, with exceptions for those who live alone; a halt to non-essential construction work; capacity limits of 25 per cent in grocery stores, pharmacies and other stores; and the closure of all outdoor recreational amenities, such as golf courses, basketball courts, soccer fields, and playgrounds — with limited exceptions.
Provincial projections for where the province is heading, released Friday, are “frustrating and frightening,” said Dr. Adalsteinn Brown, co-chair of the Ontario COVID-19 Science Advisory Table.
“The biggest problem we now face may be that we are just too tired to notice so I’m begging you as part of the team to notice,” Brown said at a news conference earlier Friday. “Notice that our hospitals can no longer function normally, they’re bursting at the seams, we’re setting up field hospitals and we’re separating critically ill patients from their families by helicoptering them across the province for care. Children’s hospitals are now admitting adults as patients. This has never happened in Ontario before, never happened in Canada before.”
Brown stressed the province needed to extend its stay-athome order by two weeks, to May 20, which Ford did.
In Hamilton, two new outbreaks were reported Friday: one at the Boys and Girls Club of Hamilton at Strathcona Elementary School, with two student/patron cases, and one at Eaglewood Place, a group home for people with developmental disabilities, with one case in a staff member. Another four outbreaks declared on Wednesday were posted for the first time: Hamilton General’s Unit 4W, JNE Group of Companies’ Fabrication Unit, Lawfield Elementary School and Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic Elementary School. The outbreak at Lawfield was also declared over as of Thursday.
Hamilton public health says its just a matter of the timing of testing for cases that cropped up before the April break that has now-shuttered schools being declared in outbreak — and being declared over soon thereafter.
“Any delays in seeking testing — and (public health) receiving and acting on the potential positive results — can impact the declaration and duration of the outbreak,” spokesperson James Berry said.
A total of 37 outbreaks are active. Outbreaks are now over at Jayne Industries Inc., Carrington Place Retirement Home, Denninger’s Foods of the World on the Mountain, Bellstone Christian School in Mount Hope, Strathcona Elementary School, Lawfield Elementary School and Cathedral High School.