There was a big jump in test positivity for “official” Covid-19 PCR tests administered to Framingham residents, according to data released today by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. That’s for the 14-day period ending January 7.
Test positivity soared to 11.8%, the highest it’s been since early February of 2022.
With so many people testing at home, the number of “official” known cases is far lower than the actual number of cases. The “official” number released today was 19.5 daily known new cases per 100,000 population. However, the number of tests administered was the second lowest it’s been since that metric has been recorded, according to the data I’ve been tracking (only one week in July of 2020 was lower). I do not have that data for the first few months of the pandemic.
The seven-day average for Covid traces found in MWRA South region wastewater is declining, which is good news and hopefully indicates that cases may decline in the immediate short term. However, except for the most recent few weeks, that’s still the highest it’s been since last January’s Omicron wave.
Covid Act Now considers both Middlesex County and Massachusetts as a whole to be at its highest risk level. It only has three levels: low, medium, and high, which - like the CDC - is a more lax scale than it used to use.
Massachusetts made Becker’s Hospital Review’s “10 places with the highest hospitalization rate per 100,000 residents” released Tuesday, tied with West Virginia and New Jersey for 6th.
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