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It may not be long before the York Region joins Toronto and Peel in the province’s “gray zone.”
The latest numbers suggest the region may actually be in worse shape than one of its GTA peers when it entered the provincial bloc less than two weeks ago.
The Toronto Star reports that the region’s infection rate of 111 per 100,000 is actually higher than that of the city of Toronto when it closed on November 23.
The York region previously avoided the gray zone by asking the province for more time to allow current public health measures to have an impact. The restrictions on the “red zone” of the regions do not seem to affect the spread.
York Region Public Health admits the rising numbers are troubling. York’s medical officer of health, Dr. Karim Kurji, says health officials are trying to figure out what is responsible for a recent increase in cases.
“Our cases in the York region had stabilized until the weekend, when we saw a dramatic increase in the number of cases,” says Kurji.
Toronto has a non-profit base ICES (The Institure for Clinical Evaluate Sciences (ICES) says its statistics show that the Vaughan area that borders Brampton has a 20.4% positive test rate, the second most high positive test rate in the province.
Health officials are increasingly concerned that the spike in infections will begin to put a strain on hospitals, something it is already happening to the structures in Toronto and Peel.
“We need to safeguard vulnerable populations in our community,” Kurji says. “We also need to look after health workers and hospital capacities and ensure they are not overwhelmed.”
Hospitals in the region currently have 66 COVID-19 patients.
The York region reported 203 new cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday.
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