COVID-19 cases rise in Hamilton and surrounding areas, new vaccine distributed

With COVID cases on the rise, be cautious if you’re using public transport to visit family this holiday weekend. Expect more mask-wearing and vaccinations due to Thanksgiving gatherings.

Coughing, body aches and congestion, COVID is on the rise in Hamilton.

According to Dr. Dominik Mertz from Health Sciences at McMaster university, figuring out exactly how bad it’s going to get, may be difficult.

During the pandemic people were constantly being tested and COVID numbers were publicized daily, but not anymore.

“We do much less testing than we used to so the case numbers aren’t really helpful at this point of time,” said Dr. Mertz.

Over three weeks in September, the seven-day average of new cases in Hamilton went from 11 to 22. During the same time period the 7-day average of hospitalizations in Hamilton went from nothing to 0.6 per cent, still very low.

Hamilton Public Health services has received the new mRNA COVID-19 XBB shot and is distributing it to hospitals. It is approved for most strains.

READ MORE: New Spikevax COVID-19 vaccine now available in Niagara

“There has not been one specific subvariant that has been dominant above all the others, there’s been kind of a mix, but all these sub variants still fall under the larger umbrella of the omicron variant,” said Associate Medical Officer of Health for the City of Hamilton, Dr. Brendan Lew.

Halton is also seeing an increase in the number of cases. Their community clinics began offering the new mRNA XBB vaccine to high risk individuals Tuesday.

They say they are expecting an additional shipment later this month and hope to offer it to the general population at that time.

“It’s hard to know exactly how many people are actually due for a vaccine, at this point I would say right now we’ve got lots of availability for those people at high risk so if you are looking for a dose come book an appointment by going to halton.ca/vaccines,” said Associate Medical Officer of Health for the Halton Region, Dr. Joanna Oda.

As for the province of Ontario, the ministry of health is reporting the following confirmed COVID-19 cases up to Sept. 23, 2023.

• 2,801 Recent cases
• 15 Recent deaths
• 209 Recent hospital admissions

CHCH News made several attempts to get the very latest COVID information from the province but our requests for interviews were denied.

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