Another record day of infections as non essential shops set to close

The data also reports 28 new deaths, for a total of 7,794. Forty-six people died.

Health authorities reported 2,349 new cases today and 46 more deaths attributed to the novel coronavirus, 13 of which occurred in the past 24 hours.

The number of hospitalizations has decreased by 15 since Wednesday, totalling 1,052 across Quebec.

Wednesday, 3,942 vaccines were administered, for a total of 11,171, and 40,358 tests were conducted.

The UK has recorded 744 more deaths, the highest daily toll since last Spring, along with more than 39,000 new coronavirus cases - the highest case number yet. Ontario's previous daily high was 2,432 infections, reported a week ago. "Their samples were sent to CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB) for further tests to check if they have the new strain of the virus", Mr Rao told news agency PTI.

The latest numbers of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Canada as of 4 a.m. December 24, 2020. With over 1,000 cases of the variant discovered in the United Kingdom, scientists are puzzled to determine if the variant, named as VUI-202012/01, represents an increased health risk especially when some nations has now begun administering vaccines among people.

New hospitalizations increased by 12, for a total of 1,067 patients in Quebec hospitals being treated for COVID-19.

It comes as the Government implemented a travel ban on passengers arriving in England from South Africa after two cases of another new strain of Covid-19 linked to the country were identified in the UK.