At present, 1,479 people are hospitalized in the province for treatment of a COVID-19 infection, including 100 in intensive care (down 5 from the previous day).
For seven days, the number of hospitalizations has fallen by 17%. This is the first time since January 3 that this number has fallen below 1,500 in the province.
The 14 more deaths bring to 13,969 the cumulative loss of life linked to the disease since the start of the pandemic.
According to the latest data from the Ministry of Health, 16,987 analyzes were carried out for screening purposes. The positivity rate is 7.4%.
The average of new cases for the past seven days stands at 1,399, a drop of more than 25% from last Saturday.
Quebec has recorded 919,996 cases declared since February 2020.
Authorities also report 709 active outbreaks.
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As for vaccination, the rate of Quebecers over the age of 5 to have received two doses of vaccine is 86%. It is 51% for people who have received a third dose of vaccine.
The number of cases announced in the daily reports must be interpreted with caution. The introduction of rapid tests and the limited access to PCR tests affect these data.
A new platform for self-reporting of cases will allow the public to report the result of a rapid test, but it is not yet clear how much of this will provide a good overview of the general situation.
Outbreak data should also be interpreted with caution. Since January 7, 2022, the review of outbreaks affecting school, work and early childhood settings is optional.
This is why it is currently difficult to reliably predict the evolution of the pandemic from these data. For now, the number of hospitalizations and deaths as well as the positivity rate are the best trend indicators.
On the other hand, the data on hospitalizations and deaths do not offer a live portrait of the epidemiological situation, since two to three weeks can pass before infections result in hospitalizations and deaths.
For a death to be officially counted, COVID-19 must have contributed to it. Infected patients who die violently (accident, suicide, homicide), for example, are not counted. We must be careful when comparing the number of deaths between provinces since Quebec calculates deaths better, according to experts.
Recently, the government distinguishes between people hospitalized “due to” or “with” COVID-19, which allows, among other things, to have a better idea of the morbidity and virulence of the virus. However, this does not change the fact that the high number of infected people in hospitals weighs heavily on their functioning.
The positivity rate corresponds to the proportion of confirmed cases among the tests carried out. Even when the total number of tests performed is low or limited, the positivity rate can tell if the level of community transmission is high. A rate of more than 5% is a sign of an uncontrolled epidemic.
Finally, the number of cases, hospitalizations and deaths per day are underestimated for the most recent days due to delays in recording data. This is why there may be differences between the figures reported each day and the data revised by theINSPQ.
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