Philadelphia struggles with upsurge, eyes restrictions

HARRISBURG » The number of new coronavirus infections is growing so quickly that Philadelphia is losing the ability to adequately trace the contacts of everybody who is testing positive and may have to impose restrictions on activity, officials said Tuesday.

The city’s health commissioner, Dr. Tom Farley, said contact tracers are unable to reach out to every new person testing positive.

As a result, city officials may resort to managing some cases through guidance or asking people who tested positive to reach out to some of the people with whom they may have had contact while contagious, Farley said.

The city is also considering imposing some restrictions, Farley said.

On Tuesday, the Pennsylvania Department of Health said it had confirmed more than 2,750 additional positive cases, the largest daily increase to date.

The state has a sevenday average of nearly 1,940 new confirmed cases per day over the past week, up from about 920 per day over the last seven days of September. That is higher than it was during the spring spike, when testing was far lower, according to the COVID Tracking Project.

It is putting pressure on more school districts to stop in-person instruction, including several in Westmoreland County, east of Pittsburgh.

Still, coronavirus-related hospitalizations, at about 210 as of Tuesday morning, are far below what they were during the spring spike in cases, when hospitalizations in the city exceeded 1,000, Farley said.

The seven-day average of hospitalizations in Pennsylvania is about 960, up from about 460 at the beginning of October, according to state data. The seven-day average of deaths is about 25, up from just below 12 at the beginning of October, according to the COVID Tracking Project.

Gov. Tom Wolf, speaking at a separate news conference Tuesday, said that, despite the upsurge in cases, hospitalization rates are still well below April’s spike.

“The key to the future and handling this resurgence is really to make sure our hospitals and health care systems don’t get overwhelmed,” Wolf said. “And the key to that is stuff like each individual Pennsylvanian practicing smart anti-COVID practices, like wearing masks, like practicing social distancing, those kinds of things.”

Impact on disabled

Advocates say they’re concerned about a new study that showed higher rates of death from CO

VID-19 among people who have intellectual and developmental disabilities.

The eight-state study suggests those patients may be more vulnerable because they are also more likely to have other serious medical problems. It relied on stateproduced data on the pandemic through May.

The report was conducted by researchers with Syracuse University, the Institute on Disabilities at Temple University, Pennsylvania Advocates and Resources for Autism and Intellectual Disabilities and the New York Alliance for Inclusion and Innovation.

The study’s organizers say the findings point to a need for greater financial support and training for people who work with those who have intellectual and developmental disabilities, and that they should be prioritized for vaccination when a vaccine becomes available.