COVID-19 hospitalizations continued on their downward trend Monday as the province reported 16 fewer people receiving care in hospitals.

There are now 1,910 people in hospital after 85 people were admitted and 101 people were discharged in the last 24 hours. ICU cases remained stable at 66.

The number of health-care workers absent due to COVID-19 stands at 6,357.

The Ministry of Health reported four new deaths related to the coronavirus, for a total of 15,143.

The province also logged 622 cases of COVID-19 through PCR testing, which is reserved for people in high-risk settings. Another 208 positive cases were recorded from rapid tests in the last 24 hours.

More signs of the situation improving are showing up in other provincial data. The health ministry reported the positivity rate dropped to 7.6 per cent on Monday, down from 9 per cent on Friday. There are also 977 active outbreaks across the province and 16,008 active cases, a decrease of 2,888 from the last update.

Health-care workers analyzed 16,694 samples on May 7.

VACCINATION UPDATE

Another 7,650 vaccine doses were administered in the last 24 hours for a total of 19,661,686 shots given out in Quebec. An additional 328,291 shots were given to Quebecers outside of the province.

The majority of the new doses administered (6,289) were fourth doses, which are openly available to all Quebec adults who want one.

To date, health-care workers have administered 7,433,459 first doses covering 91 per cent of the eligible population, 4,440,432 third doses covering 54 per cent of the population, and 921,974 fourth doses covering 11 per cent of the population.

The ministry no longer publishes data on second doses.