Mass virus cases up:

Health

Cuomo

Massachusetts has become a hot spot of coronavirus infections, drawing the concern of federal officials and promises of aid from hard-hit New York as the state’s death toll prepares to double in less than a week.

Deaths from COVID-19 are expected to surpass 2,000 this week in Massachusetts, where officials are scrambling to boost hospital capacity and trace new infections to curb the spread of the disease.

“We’re right in the middle of the surge now,” Republican Gov Charlie Baker said Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

Vice President Mike Pence said the White House is closely watching the Boston area, and the coordinator of the federal coronavirus task force, Dr. Deborah Birx, said officials are “very much focused” on Massachusetts.

There were 103 new deaths reported in Massachusetts on Monday, bringing the state’s death toll to more than 1,800. More than 1,500 new cases were reported, for a total of more than 39,500 across the state. That compares with more than 14,000 deaths in New York state and over 35,000 nationally.

Massachusetts is hoping to bend the curve by using a group of “contact tracers” to alert people who may have come in contact with someone who tested positive for the virus so they can self-quarantine or be tested themselves.

As of Thursday, contact tracers had gotten a hold of 765 people who had tested positive and those people identified more than 1,000 people they had been in close contact with, WBUR reported.

“We don’t have any other really good tools until we have a vaccine,” said Andrew Lover, an expert at the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s School of Public Health & Health Sciences.

For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough, that clear up in two to three weeks. For some, especially older adults and the infirm, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia, and death.

As the number of hospitalizations and deaths dropped in New York, which had been the epicenter of the outbreak in the US, Democratic Gov Andrew Cuomo pledged to send 400 ventilators to Massachusetts, if needed.

“You were there for us and we are going to be there for you,” Cuomo said Sunday.

Two field hospitals designed to deal with an expected surge of COVID-19 patients