COVID-19 hospitalizations, cases and deaths start to plateau as provinces lift measures

Multiple provinces have lifted many of their public health restrictions this week, citing the decline of hospitalizations, cases and deaths from the peak of the Omicron wave.

The decline of COVID-19 cases, deaths and hospitalizations across Canada has led many provinces to aggressively lift public health restrictions — yet data shows those declines have begun to plateau.

Ontario, Alberta and Manitoba ended several measures on Tuesday, including vaccination requirements for businesses and capacity limits. Other provinces, including Quebec, and Atlantic Canada, eased restrictions a day earlier, with Saskatchewan ending them entirely on Monday.

Officials have pointed to falling hospitalizations and deaths as the reason for returning to a pre-pandemic version of normal — and those numbers have, indeed, been cut in half from their peaks in January, which were fuelled by the highly transmissible Omicron variant.

But not all provinces are currently seeing hospitalizations decline. While British Columbia, Quebec and New Brunswick are seeing drops, hospital admissions are up in Ontario and Prince Edward Island as of Tuesday. And in the rest of the country, the number has stayed relatively steady over the past week, with no significant change.

Nationally, there are 4,840 patients currently receiving care in hospital after being admitted for COVID-19-related symptoms, a 15 per cent decline from a week ago. The week-to-week decline was closer to 20 per cent earlier in February.

Of those patients, 592 are in intensive care, a number that has steadily declined along with hospitalizations despite the recent uptick in admissions in some provinces.

Meanwhile, Canada has seen an average of 68 deaths per day, down from the near-record peak of over 170 daily deaths in January, but also staying steady over the past week. The country has seen more than 36,600 deaths to date since March 2020.