Five more COVID-linked deaths

The number of confirmed ongoing cases of COVID-19 in the Southwestern Public Health region of Elgin, St. Thomas and Oxford dropped considerably on Thursday, Jan. 7, to 356 from 402 on the previous day, but the number of deaths links to the virus rose to 28 from 23.

Three of the deaths were at Maple Manor Nursing Home in Tillsonburg, which is battling a huge outbreak. As of Thursday, 57 residents and 41 staff members were infected there, up from 56 and 39 respectively on Wednesday.

A fourth death was at People Care long-term care home in Tavistock, also enduring a major outbreak. The fifth death was not related to any institutional outbreaks.

The dead include: an Elgin woman, 94; two Oxford women, one 49 and one 96; and two Oxford men, 85 and 87.

The number of confirmed ongoing cases in St. Thomas and area dropped to 63 from 75, in Aylmer and area to 38 from 51, in Central Elgin to seven from nine, in Malahide to two from three and in Southwold to two from four.

Bayham remained steady at 14 cases and Dutton Dunwich at one.

In Oxford, Tillsonburg and area dropped to 98 cases from 103, Woodstock to 47 from 50, East Zorra-Tavistock to 25 from 36, Norwich to 18 from 21 and Zorra to 12 from 13.

Ingersoll and area increased to 11 from 10 and Blandford-Blenheim to five from four, while South-West Oxford remained steady at nine.

The infection rate across the Southwester region now stands at 168.3 per 100,000 of population, down from 192.4 on Wednesday.

Across Ontario, a record high number of 3,519 new COVID-19 cases were confirmed on Thursday, up from 3,266 the previous day.