With COVID-19 cases counts breaking records, Ontario is consider stricter measures. The province had more than 4,700 new cases of COVD-19 on Thursday.
The rate of active cases in Ontario is 260.22 per 100,000 people. Over the past seven days, there have been a total of 29,459 new cases. Health Minister Christine Elliott said that includes 1,188 new cases in Toronto, 983 in Peel Region and 526 in York Region.
There were also 29 new reported deaths in Ontario Thursday and 145 new reported deaths oveer the past seven days. The overall death rate is 51.85 per 100,000 people.
Premier Doug Ford has been meeting with his cabinet and is actively considering more restrictions. Under consideration are the shut down of construction to only critical infrastructure projects, limits on non-essential manufacturing and warehousing, further restrictions on religious services and retail, fining business owners if non-essential staff attend work in person and increased enforcement of the province’s stay-at-home order.
"I am concerned when I see photos of people who are clearly not socially distancing in parks," said Sylvia Jones, Ontario’s solicitor general. "I’m concerned when I see that there are line-ups unnecessarily and people are not respecting the stay-at-home order, they’re not respecting the social distancing. Look, this is serious.”
Sources also say a province-wide curfew is under consideration, but Jones wouldn’t confirm that. She did say she was concerned about the riots in Montreal after a curfew was imposed there.
The province’s associate medical officer of health, Dr. Barbara Yaffe, said Ontario’s situation is dire and the data is alarming. The data expected to be released Friday suggests 12,000-18,000 new cases of COVID-19 a day and as many as 1,800 people in ICUs.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.