Between 3,000 and 15,000 deaths from COVID-19 are possible by the end of the pandemic according to Ontario’s top health officials.
Steini Brown, the dean of the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto, says that new cases from this month alone could lead to 1,600 deaths.
However, Brown says if we had done nothing to respond to the virus, that number could be as high as 100,000.
“I talk about what this case would be like had we not taken measures, because I think it’s important to convey the seriousness of the threat presented by COVID-19, and also the issue that were we to relax or assume we were in safe territory now, this is a disease that can rear back very quickly,” Brown explains.
They say we could be dealing with the virus for the next 18 months to two years.
The projection is factoring in the current preventative measures like non-essential workplace closures and physical distancing.
Officials announced that number earlier this afternoon.
Ontario now has 3,255 confirmed positive cases, including 1,023 who have recovered. So far, 67 people have died of the disease.
There are 17 positive cases in Northwestern Ontario: five in the Northwestern Health Unit’s service area, and 12 confirmed by the Thunder Bay District Health Unit.
