1) Despite the welcome ramp-up in #COVID19 vaccinations, several disturbing facts emerged on Thursday in Montreal and across Quebec suggesting that either the second wave of the #pandemic is far from over, or that a third wave may have already begun.
2) Provincially, the number of #COVID19 outbreaks in the workplace rose for a second day in a row, up to 275 from 252 two days earlier. At this stage, it’s hard to gauge whether this increase is being driven by the more transmissible variants of concern.
3) But Quebec’s public health institute did declare its biggest single-day increase in the number of presumptive #COVID19 cases involving variants, with a cumulative total of 1,353, up by 133. The number of confirmed cases remained at 137. 
4) After relatively few outbreaks in eldercare homes recently, Quebec reported five clusters Thursday with #COVID19 cases appearing in the past 24 hours. In the most critical outbreak, the Auberge des Beaux Jours in the Montérégie (south of Montreal) posted four more cases.
5) Although schools have been closed during the March break, a primary school in Lachine and a high school in Saint-Raymond de Portneauf, northwest of Quebec City, revealed on Thursday suspected #COVID19 cases involving the variants, according to covidecolesquebec.org.
6) Meanwhile, the number of #COVID19 hospitalizations across Quebec inched up for the fourth time in five days for a total of 626. The number of deaths has also gone up slightly, by 19 to 10,445. Montreal added 10 fatalities for a death toll of 4,529. Please see the chart below.
7) Quebec’s public health institute released its latest projections taking into account not only B.1.1.7 but the mass vaccinations. Still, the INSPQ warned “average adherence to (public health restrictions) would not be sufficient to control the spread of (the) new variant.”
8) Although #COVID19 cases had been falling around the world, they are now surging in many parts of Europe, as the chart below by the Washington Post makes clear. The B.1.1.7 variant, which originated in the U.K. last year, is spreading through Europe despite its vaccine rollout.
9) Thus, it would not be an exaggeration to surmise that once schools reopen on Monday, #COVID19 cases will resume popping up, especially in the Montreal region. For this reason alone, compliance to public-health measures must be strong, not merely average. End of thread.
Addendum: the following two charts could not fit into today’s thread, so they’re being reproduced here. In the chart below, one can glimpse that Montreal appears to be at a new but lower plateau in the range of 300 daily cases.
Addendum 2: What’s striking about this last chart is the fact that Montreal’s emergency-room overcrowding has been in the red during nine of the past 10 days. I dread the possibility of a B.1.1.7 outbreak flaring up in a Montreal ER.
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