KINGSTON -- The Kingston region is seeing its highest one-day spike in new cases of COVID-19 in more than a week.
The Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington Public Health reported 17 new cases of COVID-19 in the region on Saturday. Nine of the 17 new cases of COVID-19 involve residents under the age of 30.
The health unit said six new variants of concern were identified through the positive tests.
Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox and Addington Public Health is currently in the Yellow-Protect zone in Ontario's COVID-19 reopening framework.
Speaking on CTV Morning Live Friday, medical officer of health Dr. Kieran Moore said he was optimistic COVID-19 levels were trending down in the community.
"Our counts would be in the orange range, but they're trending in the right direction which is great. It certainly takes a community effort to get our rates down," said Dr. Moore.
"Right now, over this weekend I do think we'll get back down to a yellow count. We had a real surge over the last several weeks, and variants were a big proportion of the viral pathogens that we detected. It was quite a rough couple of weeks for us in KFL&A."
The 17 new cases of COVID-19 on Saturday was the largest one-day increase in new cases since March 18, when 19 new cases of COVID-19 were reported.
This week, health officials have reported 14 new cases of COVID-19 linked to Queen's University in Kingston.
There have been 97 cases of COVID-19 linked to Queen's in March, including 15 on campus and 82 off campus.
