KEY UPDATES

 

FEDERAL

Prime Minister Trudeau did not address the media today, Federal ministers and health officials provided COVID-19 updates;

PROVINCIAL

Premier Ford began his announcement acknowledging Ontario is at a tipping point and if current trends continue, hospitals will be overwhelmed, more surgeries will be delayed and more long-term care homes will be at risk

  • The province is taking decisive action to contain COVID-19 as we wait for the vaccine to roll out
  • Premier indicated the government will be there for all Ontarians during this difficult time, this includes grants for impacted businesses of up to $20,000
  • Announced new relief measures to support people with energy costs during the province-wide shutdown; the government is introducing a new discounted off-peak rate of 8.50 cents per kilowatt hour for both time of use and tiered customers; this rate is lower than the temporary discounted rate introduced in March during the first wave
  • There is no application required for this new rate
  • To support parents during the temporary move of students to virtual learning, Premier has directed Minister Lecce to expand the Support for Learners program; parents of secondary school students will be eligible for one-time payments of $200 per child
  • Premier concluded his remarks addressing the situation at Pearson International Airport, indicating there are 60,000 international passengers arriving each week, with minimal checks in place
  • With a new, highly contagious strain of COVID-19 spreading around the world, Ontario cannot take unnecessary risks at the border
  • More needs to be done to protect against threats from outside Canadian borders
  • Premier called on the federal government to implement pre-departure tests for anyone seeking entry into Canada

YORK REGION

COVID-19 IN YORK REGION:

Below is a summary of the detailed information contained in the Interactive Dashboard – Cases at york.ca/covid19data. As of December 22, 2020 at 5 p.m. there are:

15,377 total confirmed cases 199 new cases* since yesterday 226.7 average daily cases over past 7 days 132.2 total cases per 100K population** (explanation below) 9 new hospitalizations105 confirmed cases in hospital, 23 of which are in Intensive Care 393 cases among health care workers, of which 391 cases have resolved*2 new fatalities 337 total confirmed fatalities 13,722 resolved cases 5.61% positivity rate** 77 open outbreaks under COVID-19 protocols 29 institutional (Long-Term Care/Retirement Homes/Community Care/Hospitals) 3 Child Care Centre10 Schools; 72 Schools under surveillance 0 Emergency Housing 35 Workplaces 436 closed outbreaks

*Data quality is an on-going process and may result in the more/less cases reported on a day-over-day basis or other changes to how cases are classified (e.g., municipality, acquisition, etc.). These data quality activities have also resulted in the re-categorization of individuals. Data quality activities do not increase or decrease total case counts.

**The daily COVID-19 Council Update includes the 7-day average daily case numbers, cases per 100K population, new hospitalizations and positivity rate (positivity rate refers to the percentage of positive COVID-19 tests among all individuals being tested for COVID-19).

COMBINED CASE NUMBERS:

As of this morning, there are:

More than 76.2 million total cases worldwide (524,065 new) with cases in 216 countries, area or territories; more than 1.6 million related fatalities reported by the World Health Organization (WHO) 515,314 total cases (6,381 new); with 14,332 related fatalities in Canada (68 new); 423,621 resolved in Canada (as of December 21 at 7 p.m.)160,255 total cases (2,202 new); with 4,188 related fatalities; 136,767 resolved in Ontario

KING TOWNSHIP

2 new cases reported today while our active cases drop to 28.