The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
11 towns, cities can roll back Phase 3 reopening
Eleven towns and cities, mostly in eastern Connecticut, but including Danbury, are listed in the state’s new “red alert” areas of COVID hot spots, allowing local officials to pull back from Phase 3 reopenings including 75-percent occupancy for indoor dining.
Nine of the 11 are in eastern Connecticut with New London and Norwich as that region’s largest. The other two, Hartford and Danbury, are the largest cities statewide.
But Fairfield, Bethany, Prospect and Waterbury’s daily infection rates are just slightly below those levels. Acting Public Health Commissioner Deidre Gifford stressed the need for people throughout the state to closely observe social distancing and avoid spending too much time indoors with people outside their immediate households.
“It’s in settings that people might consider to be benign because they are small and they are with people that they know,” Dr. Gifford told reporters during Gov. Ned Lamont’s daily news briefing from the State Capitol. “The transmission we’re seeing is happening among friends and family and co-workers. Whether that has been a social setting at the workplace or a social setting before or after work, or if it’s happening on the weekend with friends and family and people letting their guard down a bit on the maskwearing, that’s where we are seeing the transmission. This virus is extremely contagious.”
Red alert municipalities have average daily infection rates above 15 new cases calculated per 100,000 population over a two-week period. They include Canterbury (16.8), Danbury (15.2), East Lyme (15.3), Griswold (17.9), Hartford (17.9), Montville (16), Norwich (50), New London (46.9), Preston (16.9), Sprague (17.3) and Windham (26.6).
Over the last week the state has been at a 1.6-percent positivity rate, compared to 4 percent in
Massachusetts and 7 percent in Rhode Island. Fairfield has a 12.6 percent rate over the last two weeks; Bethany, 13; Prospect 14.6; and Waterbury, 13.3.
The governor reported three new fatalities in the pandemic, bringing the death toll to 4,540. A net increase of three patients brought statewide hospitalizations to 191. There were 213 positive tests among 15,817 administered, for a daily rate of about 1.35 percent since Wednesday.
“I don’t like the fact that Danbury is still on this as a red alert,” Lamont said. “Because we have been bringing the cavalry there for three or four weeks.”
Danbury will stay at Phase 3, at least through the weekend and could adjust based on how metrics change, Mayor Mark Boughton said Thursday on Facebook Live.
“These numbers do move up and down and we don’t want to do anything that would put anybody out of business or anything like that,” he said.
There were six new cases in Danbury on Thursday, followed by two on Wednesday. There were 33 cases reported last Saturday.
Lamont said that residents of communities listed as “orange,” with 10-to-14 cases per 100,000, should consider shying away from larger groups, while the Department of Public Health will be expanding the availability of testing.
“Be careful because orange can lead to red, as you’ve seen over the last couple of weeks,” Lamont said, stressing that recommendations include postponing indoor activities, including some sports. He stressed that there are no state orders, but local officials have the ability to scale back restaurants to Phase 2, with 50percent occupancy levels, by early next week.
Lamont said that six months ago, he ordered a statewide response that now needs flexibility. “We wanted to be fairly strict, broadly, across the board,” Lamont said. “Now, as we’re opening up, we’re on the inverse of that calculation, so we’re allowing municipalities to open up based upon the statewide metrics. But if those municipalities don’t feel comfortable, want to be a little more aggressive in terms of what they can potentially mitigate the spread, we allow them to tamp down.”
Lamont said he is contemplating that since 36 states, plus Guam and Puerto Rico, are on the list requiring visitors to selfquarantine for two weeks, he might require travelers from every state to quarantine or produce a recent negative COVID test when arriving here. “Let’s treat all these states as one,” Lamont said, adding that he has to confer on the issue with New York and New Jersey officials, as the tri-state has addressed travelers in unison.