Connecticut schools see slight drop as state’s COVID metrics stay flat

Though COVID-19 metrics remained relatively flat Thursday, there was a small decline in the number of infections in Connecticut schools in the past week, according to data from the state.

“It’s pretty flat right now,” said Ulysses Wu, chief epidemiologist at Hartford Healthcare.

The number of patients hospitalized with a coronavirus infection increased by one to a total of 100, the state said Thursday. An additional 439 COVID cases were identified out of 16,612 reported tests, for a positivity rate of 2.64 percent — a slight decline from the previous day.

The state also reported 67 patients had died with a COVID infection over the previous week, bringing the total number of coronavirus-related deaths in Connecticut to 10,744 since the start of the pandemic.

COVID cases in schools declined in the past week, after a slight bump the previous week. A total of 653 students tested positive for COVID over the past week, down from 804 on March 16. The smallest number of school-based COVID cases was March 9, when there were 637 cases.

Of the 653 students identified with COVID, all but 153 are considered fully vaccinated against the virus, figures from the state show.

COVID among school staff also remained flat this week, a total of 166 cases identified, the same as the previous week. This represented a slight increase from Feb. 23, when there were 141 staff cases, the lowest COVID caseload among school-based staff since November.

That slow, steady downward trend is amid a rise of BA.2 in Connecticut. The omicron subvariant, which is thought to be 30 percent more infectious than omicron, is being blamed in part for a rising tide of COVID in Europe and Asia.

Yale researcher Nathan Grubaugh said this week he expects BA.2 to comprise 80 percent of tested samples within days. When asked why Connecticut was not seeing the same rise in cases, Wu said he could not be sure, though he cited high vaccination rates in this state.

The state Department of Public Health said Thursday that more than 95 percent of residents older than 55 had been fully vaccinated against COVID.

“I don't know the status of their vaccination nor their immunity nor their epidemiology in terms of why they're having more transmission,” he said.

Joseph Prezioso / AFP / TNS A health worker administers a dose of COVID vaccine during a vaccination clinic for children 12 to 15 years old at Hartford Hospital on Jan. 6.