Ottawa has broken its coronavirus wastewater record 6 days in a row

• Ottawa's coronavirus wastewater is still in record-high territory.
• City reports large one-day increase in COVID-19 hospitalizations.
• Health-care outbreaks remain stable.

Today's Ottawa update

Theaverage level of coronavirus detected in Ottawa'swastewaterhas reachedanother record high with the latest update (the bold red line in the graph below).

The latest report shows the wastewater levelis more than six times higher thanbefore thesurge startedin early March,and much higher than the previous record in January 2022.

Those records don't reflect the first wave of the pandemicwhen wastewater was not monitored for traces of the virus.

Wastewater is a keyindicatorof whatOttawa Public Health (OPH)calls a concerning resurgence of COVID-19in the city.

Nineteen Ottawa residents are in local hospitals for COVID-19 treatment, according to Tuesday's OPHupdate, and two of them are in intensive care. Hospitalizations have generally been stable since earlyMarch, but Tuesday'sone-day increase brings the total to a number last seen in mid-February.

Experts had said the current spread may not, for the most part, have made its way into older age groups, and say both vaccination and increasing immunitymay becontributing to that relative stability.

Hospitalization figures don't includepatients admitted for other reasons whothen tested positive for COVID-19. Nor do they include those admitted for lingering COVID-19complications, nor patients transferredfrom other health units.

That number stabilized in its most recent update afterrising for a week.

Testing strategies have changedunderthe contagiousOmicron variant, which means many newCOVID-19 casesaren't reflected in current counts. Only outbreaks that occur in health-care settings are recorded.

On Tuesday, OPH reported 79 moreCOVID-19 cases and no more deaths.The health unit also reported 21 health-care outbreaks, which is stable.

The rolling weekly incidence rate of newly confirmedCOVID-19 cases, expressed per 100,000 residents, remainsaround 110.

At 19 per cent, the averagepositivity rate for those who received PCR tests outside long-term care homes has been slowly rising. The averagein these homes remains around five per cent. The next testing update is expected Wednesday.

As of Monday's weekly update, 92 per cent of eligible Ottawa residents have at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose, 88 per cent have at least two, and 62per cent of residents age 12 and up have at least three.

Across the region

Quebec'sinstitute of public healthand thehead of the OntarioScience Advisory Tablesay their provinces are in the midst of another pandemic wave. Quebec will keep its mask mandatethrough at least the end of April, while Ontario's health minister says the province can manage the increase in cases and hospitalizations.

Communities outside Ottawa are reporting about 60COVID-19 hospitalizations, which has been slowly rising since mid-March.About10of themremain in intensive care, which is stable.

Neither of those numbersincludes Hastings Prince Edward Public Health, which has a different method of counting.

Western Quebec's COVID hospitalization count rises slightly to 14 after about a month around 10. The count includes one patient in the ICU.

Recent wastewaterdata from the Kingston area includesome of the highest readings of 2022. The wastewater signal is alsorisingacross LGL's sites.