Massachusetts adds 1,543 new coronavirus cases, 20 deaths

Massachusetts health officials on Thursday reported 1,543 new coronavirus cases on Friday as 20 more people died of the disease statewide, though trends remain generally positive.

The 1,543 new cases is up a bit from the 1,486 from the previous day, though cases have been trending downward over the past couple of weeks following an uptick driven by the highly contagious delta variant.

The big four data points — rolling averages for positive test rate, hospitalizations and daily cases and deaths — all remain trending generally positively following a recent uptick through late August and early September. The seven-day average of cases continues to drop, now at 1,069, down from nearly twice that in the middle of September.

The average number of daily deaths is at 13, more or less holding steady after a rise over the past month. The positive test rate, at 1.96%, is up by several hundredths of a percentage point, but is well lower than the approximately 3% recent peak of a month ago.

The seven-day average of hospitalizations nudged downward to below 615 after a recent peak of a couple of weeks ago. All four data points remain well below the massive initial surge in spring 2020 and the second one in January.

State health officials also reported 105 “probable” cases. Over the past two weeks, people 20-29 years old and, to a lesser extent, 30-39, are the two biggest age brackets getting sick.

The 20 deaths on Friday bring the total reported amount in Massachusetts to 18,260 confirmed and 387 probable. The disease is confirmed to have sickened 759,392, with more than 54,000 “probable” cases in addition.

There are currently 602 people in Massachusetts hospitals with the virus, including 158 in intensive-care units and 99 intubated. Both of those numbers also continue to edge back downward.

Of the 6,824 “new clusters” — situations where two or more COVID-19 cases have been linked to each other since late August — the vast majority are of people in the same household.

The state has more than 4.6 million vaccinated residents out of 7 million people in total.

from Boston Herald https://ift.tt/3D3Emll