BARRIE, ONT. -- The region's top doctor says he's currently not in the position to request the province to move the Simcoe Muskoka into Grey restrictions but supports the province's decision if they were to put Ontario back into lockdown to curb the third wave.

"I am actually more concerned about where the province as a whole is going," admits Dr. Charles Gardner, Medical Officer of Health with the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit.

"There are many more parts of the province that are in red or potentially moving into grey and that if we end up with a continuation of transmission pattern we've got that the province may need to move into a broad regional shut down, but we shall see."

According to Dr. Gardiner, local infection rates have levelled off, with numbers sitting at about 50 per 100,000 population. But looking at weekly case counts, numbers continue to fluctuate, from 212 positive infections the week of February 28th to 307 the week of March 7th, then back down to 261 the week of March 14th.

"So basically a saw-tooth pattern, kind of an up and down pattern of change that we're seeing over the last few weeks," says Dr. Gardner.

On Tuesday, the local health unit reported another person, a woman over 80 - has died from COVID-19 complications in the region as it logged another 32 Simcoe Muskoka residents who have tested positive for the deadly virus.

Most of the cases reported by local health officials were in Bradford with 10, Innisfil with seven, and six in Barrie.

There are currently 32 people in the hospital, with nearly half admitted since Friday - eight yesterday alone - with patients ranging in age from their 20s to 90s, with nine patients in the ICU.

The health unit also reported it's seeing an increase in variant cases with 59 more positive tests bringing the region now to 1,232 variants of concern.

While nearly 90,000 doses of the vaccine have been administered across the region, Dr. Gardner believes we're losing the race between these cases and the vaccines.

"What we've got is basically flatline in terms of vaccine we're receiving vaccine that is projected out six weeks and beyond, so not an increase essentially and that's disappointing. We were hoping to continue to get more of it; we certainly have the capacity in our system to be able to take a lot more."