Ontario reports 3,369 new COVID-19 cases as ICU admissions climb to 900

Ontario reported 3,369 new cases of COVID-19 and 29 more deaths on Saturday as overall admissions to intensive care units climbed to 900 for the first time.

Some 2,152 people in the province remain in hospital because of the infectious disease, a figure that has consistently been trending upward since the start of the third wave of the pandemic.

Of the patients in ICUs, 637 require ventilators to breathe.

As hospitals continue to move critically ill patients around the province and bring in health care personnel from other provinces, the Ontario health ministry said on Saturday that it hasn’t yet activated an ICU triage protocol.

Activating a triage would mean the hardest decisions health-care providers ever face will have to be made. These decisions include who gets potentially life-saving care and who doesn’t.

In a statement, the ministry said the current stay-at-home order — combined with investments to increase hospital beds across the province — means this more drastic step has not yet been taken.

“These efforts combined with the ramping down of elective surgeries and other non-emergent/urgent clinical activity will add an additional 700 — 1,000 beds and ensure our health system has the tools and resources needed to provide world-class care to every Ontarian who requires hospitalization,” the ministry said in the statement.

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Last month, however, a number of Ontario medical professionals said they feared they may be forced to start triaging ICU patients within weeks.

According to the latest draft of Ontario’s protocol, which is a work in progress, the lowest level of triage, Level 1, means anyone with short-term mortality risk greater than 80 per cent is de-prioritized for an ICU bed.

Anthony Dale, president of the Ontario Hospital Association, said it would be considered a “failure” if hospitals had to enact a triage protocol given that efforts are being made across the province to provide every patient with the care they need.

“We’re working as hard as humanly possible … to make sure that it never comes into effect,” he said.

“We are fighting everyday to prevent it from occurring.”

WATCH | Ontario Hospital Association president speaks about the situation in ICUs:

Hospitals ‘working as hard as humanly possible,’ to keep triage protocol from being enacted37 minutes ago
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Ontario Hospital Association President Anthony Dale says hospitals across the province are working “fighting everyday” to keep triage protocols from being enacted. 1:10

Dale said there is also a glimmer of hope based on the latest COVID-19 modelling projections released last week, which suggest the province’s third wave of the pandemic may have already reached its peak.

Despite this hope, Dale said the situation in ICUs is far worse than he had feared.

“Months ago, I never in my dreams would have thought that we could have reached this very high level of patients [in ICUs],” he told CBC News on Saturday.

“I never thought we would see anything like this.”