Ottawa, Dec 24 (IANS): Ontario, Canada's most populous province, has reported 5,790 new Covid-19 cases, breaking a record for the highest number of single-day infections registered in a day.

Thursday's cases has increased the cumulative total number of Covid-19 cases in Ontario to 667,353, with 10,140 deaths, reports Xinhua news agency.

It comes after the province confirmed 3,453 new cases on Tuesday and 4,383 new cases on Wednesday.

Ontario's rolling seven-day average has soared to 4,001, up from 1,674 at this point last week.

With 68,191 tests processed in the past 24 hours, the province's positivity rate rose on Thursday to 16 per cent, which marks the highest rate ever, according to the Ontario government.

Of the new cases Thursday, 1,398 cases involved people who are unvaccinated, partially vaccinated or their vaccination status is unknown.

The remaining 4,392 infections involved people who are fully vaccinated.

Of the reported 5,790 new cases, 637 cases were identified in children under age 12, and 560 cases in youth between the ages of 12 and 19 and another 2,662 cases in people between the ages of 20 and 39.

An additional 90 infections were reported in schools across the province, which involved 71 students and 20 staff members.

Some 1,151 of the province's 4,844 schools have confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 21 facilities were closed as a result.

Ontario will go into a strict province-wide lockdown on December 26, forcing nearly all non-essential businesses to close.

The lockdown will begin at 12.01 a.m. and will last until January 23, 2022, according to the Ontario government.

Canada's Chief Public Health Officer Theresa Tam has stressed that case counts could be "very high" by early January due to the fast spread of the new Omicron variant.

As of Friday morning, Canada's overall Covid caseload has increased to 1,945,754, with 30,131.