COVID-19 Case Numbers Continue To Rise, Severe Illness Remains Low
BOSTON — As case numbers in Massachusetts schools continue to rise, COVID-19 levels detected in wastewater also continue to grow.
Massachusetts health officials reported 1,442 new COVID-19 cases Friday and 10 new deaths. The seven-day average positivity rate in Massachusetts was 2.47 percent — up slightly from 2.36 percent the week before.
The state's positive rate hit a high of 23 percent on Jan. 5 due to the highly contagious omicron variant, when officials say wastewater levels had peaked. By Jan. 12, those numbers were starting to come down and remained stagnant for a few months, prompting the statewide removal of masks mandates for public schools, and the removal of a universal mask mandate for indoor businesses throughout Massachusetts.
Now, rising case numbers are prompting health care officials to push for vaccinated individuals to get booster shots to help reduce the risk of infection. According to Dr. Paul Sax, clinical director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at Brigham and Women's Hospital who spoke with the Boston Globe, a third shot of a two-dose vaccine is critical for reducing the risk of hospitalization and death.
Often the first to predict a spike or rise in case numbers, the coronavirus wastewater tracker shows an increase from the start of March. South of Boston's COVID-19 wastewater average has increased 60 percent from the start of the month's low levels, and the north of Boston's average has gone up 20 percent.
Read more: COVID Wastewater Levels On The Rise In Boston Area
The recent increase in the COVID-19 wastewater is likely due to the loosening of mask mandates and businesses bringing people back in, said Davidson Hamer, a Boston University specialist in infectious diseases told the Boston Herald last week.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the omicron BA.2 subvariant, more commonly known as the "stealth" omicron, accounts for 72.6 percent of COVID-19 cases circulating across the state, compared with about half of new infections nationally.
Infectious disease experts are also under the impression that the BA.2 subvariant is leading to spikes in European cases, as the U.K. hit a record number of 5 million cases Sunday, largely due to the more transmissible BA.2 subvariant, which is the dominant verson across the county.
According to The Associated Press, hospitalizations and death rates are rising throughout Europe again, but the number of people dying is still relatively low compared to earlier this year.
The new subvariant has several key mutations, with the most important occurring in the spike protein that studs the outside of the virus. Similar to the original omicron variant, BA.2 has genetic changes not seen in the initial version, the CDC said.
Right now, it has not been declared a variant of concern on its own, but Brookline Public Schools are updating their masking protocols in response to recent upticks in the district.
"We reported 72 cases to DESE on Wednesday, March 23, and reported 94 cases on COVID-19 Dashboard this week," said Brookline Public Schools Student Health Services in a letter to the community. "While this is a definite increase in cases, it is also indicative of the seriousness with which our community has responded to the pandemic and our broad use of the rapid antigen tests, both in weekly surveillance tests and in the testing of symptomatic individuals at school and at home."
According to state Department of Public Health data, more than 3,245 students and staff across the state tested positive for COVID-19 on March 31 — up from 2,500 students and staff the week before.
Outside of schools in Massachusetts, state data indicated a seven-day average of about 970 new cases as of March 30, up from about 600 cases earlier in the month.
This article originally appeared on the Boston Patch
