COVID-19 in Waterloo region's wastewater appears to have plateaued, but remains high

New wastewater data shows COVID-19 signals appear to have plateaued in Waterloo region but still remain high.

Researchers from the University of Waterloo have been testing wastewater in the three cities and the region updates a dashboard with the findings each Friday.

The latest update notes the wastewater signal is "dominated" by the Omicron sub-variant BA-2.

Region of Waterloo Public Health reported one new death of a person with COVID-19 on Friday, bringing the total number of COVID-related deaths in the community to 407.

There were 56 people with the virus in the region's three hospitals as of Friday. There were eight people in the intensive care unit either with COVID-19 or recovering from it.

There were 15 outbreaks in the region:

• Six in long-term care and retirement homes.
• Six in congregate settings.
• Three in hospitals.

The region's vaccination dashboard, which is updated on Thursdays, showed:

• 84.3 per cent of all residents have received one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.
• 81.4 per cent have two doses.
• 48.4 per cent have a booster dose.