Under the Ontario Health Protection and Promotion Act (HPPA), healthcare institutions (hospitals, long-term care homes and retirement homes) are required to monitor staff and patients/residents for signs and symptoms of gastroenteric (e.g., nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, fever) and respiratory (e.g., cough, runny nose, sore throat, fever) infections. Healthcare institutions must also actively look for, detect and report suspected and/or confirmed outbreaks to their local public health unit. An outbreak is defined as a localized increase (e.g. in an institution, or a specific ward or floor within an institution) in the rate of infection or illness, above that which is expected.
Under the HPPA, Toronto Public Health is required to respond to reports of suspected and confirmed outbreaks of gastroenteric and respiratory illness. Toronto Public Health works with healthcare institutions to prevent and control institutional outbreaks, including the use of best practices in infection prevention and control.
The most recent dataset is updated weekly on Thursdays with data as of the Wednesday at 2pm.
*Please note that all instances of "Coronavirus*" in the datasets refer to the seasonal coronavirus, commonly identified as a causative agent for institutional respiratory outbreaks, and not COVID-19.
