A woman in her 40s has become the latest from the Waterloo region to suffer a COVID-19-related death on Sunday, according to Waterloo Public Health.
“Today we are reporting one death in our community where COVID-19 was a contributing factor,” Dr. Hsiu-Li Wang, the region’s medical officer of health told Global News in a statement.
Wang said the region’s 134th COVID-19 victim had underlying conditions and was in hospital at the time of her death.
“Although groups such as older adults and those with pre-existing medical conditions are at greater risk, no one is immune to the development of infection, nor the possibility of serious complications and death,” she warned.
On Saturday, the region reported two other COVID-19-related deaths. Both were women over the age of 70 who had underlying conditions, Wang stated.
Waterloo Public Health reported 83 new positive tests on Sunday, a day after reporting just 56. There have now been 4,460 COVID-19 cases in Waterloo Region since the pandemic first arrived in the area in March.
Forty people were reported clear of the virus on Sunday, a day after it was announced that 63 others were also COVID-19 free. There have now been 3,872 cases resolved in Waterloo Region.
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This leaves the area with 453 active cases including 37 people who are in hospital with 13 of those being in intensive care.
St. Mary’s General Hospital in Kitchener declared an outbreak of COVID-19 on its fifth floor involving two patients and a staff member.
The hospital has another outbreak on its sixth floor, although it says an investigation on its seventh floor did not conclude there was an outbreak.
An outbreak was declared at Cambridge Memorial Hospital in its Medicine C inpatient unit on Saturday, a day after another was declared in its Medicine A Unit.
There are also two active outbreaks at Grand River Hospital in Kitchener.
In all, there are 27 active outbreak units in Waterloo Region.
Elsewhere, Ontario reported 1,677 new cases of the novel coronavirus Sunday, bringing the total number of cases in the province to 140,181.
Sixteen deaths were also reported, raising the provincial death toll to 3,949.
*With files from Global News’ Ryan Rocca
© 2020 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
