MONTREAL -- As Quebec announced Friday that anyone over 65 years old is now able to book an appointment for a COVID-19 vaccination, the province reported that 38,459 more vaccine doses were administered in the last day for a total of 872,459 vaccinations across the province.

A total of 9.8 per cent of Quebec's population has now been vaccinated against the novel coronavirus.

Quebec's Ministry of Health looks to up vaccine doses to between 50,000 and 100,000 per day.

Health Minister Christian Dube sees the private sector as playing a big part moving forward.

At a news conference Friday, Dube said some private businesses have raised their hands and will be part of the vaccination campaign joining pharmacies, which will begin vaccinations next week.

"We want them to be able to take this overload between 50,000 and say, 100,000, to be able to say, well, the public system, the public will be able to continue to do what they have to do every day on the non-COVID issues and ask the pharmacists, and the businesses to take this over," said Dube.

Dube hopes to have the private-sector option by June, and said it was premature to start naming those companies that have stepped forward."

"A lot of companies have raised their hands," said Dube, adding that those who want to be involved in the campaign to go to the government's website.

DAILY NUMBERS 

The province also reported that 764 more people have tested positive for COVID-19, bringing the total number of infections to 300,916 since the start of the pandemic. 

Of those, 283,478 are reported to have recovered from the disease, an increase of 785.

In addition, Quebec reported 11 new deaths Friday including one in the past 24 hours, five between March 12 and March 17, four before March 12, and one at an unknown date. 

Since the start of the pandemic, 10,587 people in Quebec have died due to the disease.

Hospitalizations decreased again to end the week with the province reporting that 15 fewer patients are receiving care in Quebec hospitals for a total of 504 hospitalizations. Of those, 99 people are in intensive care wards, a decrease of two. 

On March 17, health-care professionals analyzed 32,704 samples. (Quebec releases its sampling data from two days prior to its daily updates).

REGIONAL DATA

Montreal reported the highest number of new cases with 317 new (112,146 total), followed by 70 new cases each in Laval (26,177 total) and Monteregie (43,127 total), 69 in Lanaudiere (21,294 total), and 57 in the Lower Laurentians (17,322 total).

Five deaths were reported in Montreal (4,589 total), two in Outaouais (168 total), and one death was reported in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean (265 total), Laval (881 total), and Lanaudiere (499 total).

One death was also reported in the Cree Territory of James Bay, which is just the third death due to COVID-19 reported there.