1 new confirmed case of COVID-19 variant in Hamilton and 1 more outbreak with variant
Hamilton Public Health Services is reporting the new variant case is B117, the variant first seen in the U.K.
Hamilton Public Health Services (HPHS) has confirmed a sixth COVID-19 variant of concern in the city on Sunday.
The local public health unit is reporting it as B117, the variant first seen in the U.K.
This comes as HPHS is waiting to confirm 249 cases that screened positive as variants.
One week ago, the city had four confirmed variant cases and 106 that screened positive, which shows the number of potential variant cases has doubled.
The variants are said to spread easier and be more deadly.
HPHS has also detected a variant of concern within the outbreak at DHL Supply Chain.
There are three cases there, but it is unclear how many screened positive for the variant.
Hamilton's COVID-19 figures continue to slowly rise
Hamilton confirmed 131 new cases this weekend, 83 of which came on Sunday.
The city's COVID-19 test positivity rate is at 2.9 per cent (which means 2.9 per cent of all COVID-19 tests in Hamilton are positive).
The local medical officer of health, Dr. Elizabeth Richardson, has previously said anything above three per cent impacts the effectiveness of contact-tracing efforts.
There are 509 active cases of COVID-19 in the city and Hamilton's weekly rate of new cases per 100,000 people is growing, now at 73.
WATCH: Virus variants may cause half of confirmed COVID-19 cases by late March, professor says
The city's reproduction number also grew from last week to 1.15 (which means, on average, a person with COVID-19 will infect one other person).
Roughly one in four people testing positive are in their 20s.
Since March 2020, a total of 11,241 people have been infected (confirmed and probable cases) and 295 people have died after contracting COVID-19.
Forty-eight people are in hospital with the virus. The total number of resolved cases stands at 10,262.
30 active outbreaks
There are 30 active outbreaks, two of which are new.
A staff member at the Mission Services Shelter overflow in East Hamilton tested positive for the virus. There are also three cases at Hamilton General Hospital in Unit 8 West (two patients and one worker). Neither outbreak has screened positive for variants of concern.
And other outbreaks continue to grow.
The outbreak at the F3 unit in Juravinski Hospital grew from five patient cases to 14 on Sunday. None of the cases involve variants.
DHL Logistics on Mount Hope grew from 12 staff cases to 14 on Sunday.
The outbreak at the Good Shephard Shelter set up in the Cathedral Boys School is over after three clients tested positive for the virus with no cases of variants.
53,216 vaccines administered in Hamilton
As of the end of Thursday, public health says it has administered 53,216 doses of vaccine, nearly 12,000 more since last week.
That includes 13,387 at the mobile clinic, 34,699 doses the Hamilton Health Sciences fixed clinic and 5,130 at the St. Joseph's Healthcare site.
Hamilton city officials are urging people eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine to use the province's online booking tool once it opens on Monday.
Brant's active cases double in 1 week
The county of Brant has 76 active cases according to data online Sunday. That's double the number last week.
There have been 1,604 cases since March and 12 deaths.
There is one person hospitalized with COVID-19.
A total of 1,516 cases have been marked as resolved.
There have been 14,965 doses of the vaccine administered and 12 COVID-19 variants of concern detected.
Haldimand-Norfolk has 44 active cases
Haldimand and Norfolk counties are reporting a total of 44 active cases of COVID-19 on Sunday.
There have been 1,502 cases throughout the pandemic. Of those, 1,414 are labelled as recovered.
The local public health unit has linked the virus to 39 deaths.
There have been 12,157 doses of the vaccine administered.
Halton passes 10,000 COVID-19 cases
The number of COVID-19 cases in Halton rose by 43 on Sunday, for a total of 10,043.
The data shows 277 of those cases are active.
Twelve of the new cases were in Burlington, which has seen 2,532 cases of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic. There are 61 active cases in the city.
A total of 198 people across the region have died after being infected with the virus, 49 of them in Burlington.
The region is reporting 21 confirmed variants of concern, two of which are in Burlington.
Niagara has 33 new cases
Niagara is reporting 33 new cases of COVID-19 on Sunday. The region has seen 8,924 cases over the course of the pandemic, including 260 that are active.
A total of 373 deaths have been linked to the virus over the course of the pandemic.
Meanwhile, 8,291 cases are marked as resolved.
There have been 13,250 doses of the vaccine administered in Niagara.
Six Nations active cases drop
As of Friday, Six Nations of the Grand River had 40 active COVID-19 cases, according to Ohsweken Public Health.
That's three times lower than it was last week when there were 114 active cases.
It says there are four people in hospital. There have been 411 cases reported there over the course of the pandemic and five deaths.