Two days after reporting three COVID-19 related deaths, Waterloo Public Health reported another five on Friday, lifting the death toll in the area to 270.
There was no report on Thursday as it was a holiday but the three-day total of eight deaths is one less than what was reported in Waterloo Region for the entire month of June.
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“Today we are reporting five deaths in our community related to COVID-19,” stated Dr. Rabia Bana, associate medical officer of health.
“The individuals were a male in his 40s, a male in his 70s, a male in his 80s, a male in his 90s and a female in her 100s. I wish to express my deep sympathy to the family and loved ones of each individual.”
She said that although the overall COVID-19 picture in Waterloo Region has improved, the deaths tend to follow after the area sees a high number of cases.
“While we are starting to see some improvement in our current trends, the increase in deaths is not unexpected,” Bana explained.
“Hospitalizations, people requiring ICU care and sadly, deaths, are lagging indicators that we see increase in the weeks following higher case rates.”
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One of the deaths occurred at the Marian Residence in Cambridge, where an outbreak involving two residents and two staff members was declared on Monday.
A spokesperson for Waterloo Public Health could not say whether the victim had been vaccinated or not.
One of last month’s deaths involved a fully-vaccinated woman in her 90s who was a resident at The Village of Winston Park.
As Bana stated, other reporting areas surrounding COVID-19 are on the upswing.
Waterloo Public Health reported 83 new positive tests for the coronavirus on Friday, pushing the total number of COVID-19 cases to 17,667.
That drops the seven-day rolling average number of new cases down to 51.9, down from 55.1, a week earlier.
The number of people cleared of the virus was up by 107 to 16,992.
This dropped the number of active cases down to 392, a number that has not been below 400 since June 10.
There are still 55 people in area hospitals with COVID-19 including 24 who are in need of intensive care.
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The number of vaccinations was down on Thursday, but the region’s vaccine distribution task force says there have now been 565,267 jabs in the area, 16,796 more than it reported on Wednesday.
The area has now seen 66.7 per cent of all residents receive at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, while 29.77 per cent of all residents are full vaccinated.
Elsewhere, Ontario reported 484 total new COVID-19 cases for the past two days, bringing the provincial total to 545,381.
There were no reported numbers on Thursday due to Canada Day. There were 200 new cases on Friday and 284 on Thursday.
The death toll in the province has risen to 9,196 as 28 more deaths were recorded over the two-day period.
*With files from Global News’ Jess Patton
