Gov’s begging residents to stay home for holidays
Gov: Stay home for holidays
Gov. Charlie Baker is begging people to stay home for the holidays and warned of more regulations to come if a second surge of coronavirus cases following Christmas mirrors one that has pushed the state’s hospitals to the brink in the aftermath of Thanksgiving.
“We’re basically begging everyone to stay within their immediate household over the course of this holiday season,” Baker said during his regular coronavirus briefing at the State House on Monday. “We simply can’t afford to have another spike.”
Coronavirus cases and hospitalizations have “slowed slightly but not enough” since they shot up in the days after Thanksgiving, Baker said.
Ten days before the November holiday, Massachusetts was averaging 2,501 new daily cases. By 10 days after, the seven-day average had reached 4,668 — a 96% increase, Baker said.
Hospitalizations have seen similar gains: There has been a 95% increase in the number of COVID-19 patients and an 85% in
crease in intensive-care patients since the Nov. 27, the day after Thanksgiving, public health data show.
As of Sunday, there were 1,919 people with coronavirus in hospitals and 387 in the ICU, according to the Department of Public Health COVID-19 dashboard.
“With the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, we, unfortunately, anticipate there could be another significant surge,” Baker said, noting “there is serious danger of overwhelming our health care system,” if that happens.
Should that happen, the Republican governor said “every option is on the table” and hinted at addi
tional coronavirus restrictions, saying “we’re currently reviewing additional steps that we can take to minimize the impact.”
Statewide, hospitals are at 83% capacity on average, according to public health data. In Boston and Metrowest that number increases to 86%. A field hospital at Worcester’s DCU Center reopened earlier this month and the state has plans to open a second with Lowell General Hospital and UMass Lowell.
There are “conversations” for a third field hospital on the South Coast, but Baker made no mention of reopening Boston’s 1,000-bed emergency hos
pital that served COVID-19 patients over the spring and summer.
Baker says the surge is not receding and is putting “immense pressure” on the health care system.
Last Monday, Baker rolled back the state’s reopening to Phase 3, Step 1, a move not seen as strict enough by a consortium of area mayors who took coronavirus restrictions into their own hands, rolling back a step farther to close gyms, fitness centers, bowling alleys, arcades, museums, movie theaters, aquariums and indoor event spaces in cities including Boston, Somerville, Newton, Arlington, Lynn and Winthrop.