Virus variants invade state
Infections spiking once again
As coronavirus cases continue to spike across Massachusetts, the state has the second highest number of reported cases of the more contagious Brazilian variant in the U.S. and ranks high for U.K. variant cases, prompting public health experts urge residents to stay on high alert.
The Bay State was leading the country for the number of reported cases of the P.1 Brazilian variant until Florida moved ahead on Sunday. Massachusetts has reported 102 P.1 cases, Florida has 126 cases.
Massachusetts also has the
‘It is a race between variants and vaccines. The state numbers have sort of bumped up, drifted up a little bit recently.’
– Boston University infectious diseases specialist Davidson Hamer
fourth-highest number of reported cases of the B.1.1.7 U.K. variant. The state has reported 1,100 of the B.1.1.7 cases.
“This is a serious strain,” said Boston University infectious diseases specialist Davidson Hamer, noting that the U.K. variant is 60% to 70% more transmissible, and is more likely to cause severe disease and death.
“It really fits the term ‘variant of concern.’ We should be concerned about this,” he added.
Meanwhile, as the variants spread across the state, virus case counts have been spiking during the last month. Massachusetts had a daily average of 2,227 cases during the first week of April, compared to an average of 1,378 daily cases in the first week of March.
The number of high-risk communities in Massachusetts has jumped from 14 one month ago to 77 in the state’s most recent weekly report.
“It is a race between variants and vaccines,” Hamer said. “The state numbers have sort of bumped up, drifted up a little bit recently. That’s in particular because B.1.1.7 is circulating pretty widely. We need to keep moving as fast as we can to get vaccines out, and try to minimize vaccine hesitancy to really get this under control.”
The variant cases are based on a sampling of COVID-19 positive specimens, and do not represent the total number of variant cases that may be circulating.
Cape Cod, which has several communities in the high-risk “red zone” for the virus, has the highest number of reported P.1 cases. Barnstable County has about 70% of the state’s P.1 reported cases.
“It’s been fast-moving here in Barnstable County,” said Yarmouth Health Director Bruce Murphy. “We really need to get ahead of the surge and the third wave on the Cape by getting additional vaccines to the Cape.
“We need more of it and sooner,” he said of the vaccines. “As more vaccine comes into the state, it should be redistributed to areas that are showing high numbers of cases.”
Hamer urged Bay State residents to be cautious while out in public.
“The next four to eight weeks are really going to be crucial if people can sort of try and minimize risky behavior in terms of eating indoors and having large social gatherings,” Hamer added.
The Boston University community has started to see an increase in B.1.1.7 cases, according to Judy Platt, director of BU Student Health Services.
“With the COVID vaccines rolling out, we do have this important milestone in sight, but with the increase in variants combined with pandemic fatigue, it’s the perfect storm to create a fourth wave of COVID cases,” Platt said in BU’s most recent weekly COVID-19 report.
She added, “At BU, we’ve seen a small number of students who needed to go to the hospital. A handful of students have even developed pericarditis — inflammation of the lining around the heart.”