“I’d rather act too early than act too late,” said Dr. David Rosman, president of the society and associate president of radiology at Massachusetts General Hospital. “Our priority must be children, school and health. That’s where we should focus. “
Rosman, the father of two children, ages 8 and 10, said he realizes that closing certain industries again would significantly and adversely affect many people’s livelihoods.
“We need to decide, as a community, how much we value being able to reopen the schools,” Rosman said. “If that’s a high priority, as I think it should be, we have to make sacrifices about it. Ultimately, it’s about our patients, our neighbors, and our families. “
Over the past week, the positive testing rate for COVID-19 has risen from 1.7 percent to 1.9 percent, after a downward trend earlier this month and then remaining relatively stable. Authorities reported increases of more than 200 cases in four of the past five days.
On Monday, the number of cases increased by 182, to a total of 108,562. The number of deaths from confirmed cases increased by seven to 8,317.
“Obviously, we would prefer to see zero new cases of COVID, but we know that will not be the case until we have a medical breakthrough such as a vaccine,” Governor Charlie Baker said during a press conference.
Baker said officials are closely analyzing the trend data and are familiar with some small groups associated with the meetings, including a private party in Chatham and recent information about a Baystate Health employee. The governor said the employee traveled to a critical point and was “lazy” about wearing masks.
He said the summer months present unique challenges in fighting the virus.
“We can also assume that there is simply much more mobility, some of that as a result of the economic activity associated with the opening of some of the businesses and employers in our community,” he said. “But some of them are also just people who are away from home: it is hot, and people in general are more in contact with people now than in the months of April, May and even June.”
When asked to comment on Rosman’s suggestion that the state should reverse the course of the reopening, Baker said that people who scoff at health guidelines, not reopening policies, were largely to blame for groups in cases.
“Public health data is going to drive our decision-making, but so far, most of the data we see on the origin of the groups has had much more to do with people who have simply let their guard down more than anything else.” , said.
Baker cited large private parties and not wearing masks as examples of behaviors that ignored the health guide and led to more cases.
But Helen Jenkins, an assistant professor of biostatistics at the Boston University School of Public Health, said the latest state data gives her pause.
“I think the increase is troubling and shows how little reopening can begin to increase the numbers,” said Jenkins. “My hope is that Governor Baker is on the lookout for this, and I hope that he prioritizes schools in his decision-making and considers reversing other things like casinos, gyms, and indoor dining so that schools even have a chance to reopen in fall.”
At the same time, Dr. Helen Boucher, chief of the Division of Geographic Medicine and Infectious Diseases at Tufts Medical Center, is taking a more wait-and-see approach. Boucher noted that the COVID-19 case rate rose to 1.9 percent for a few days earlier this month before trending downward.
She said she would be concerned if the number of infections, or the positive case rate, continued to rise.
“I am a mother of two daughters and no one wants to succeed so that our students return to school more safely than I do. We have to be very focused on the data, ”said Boucher. “But one thing I learned from the pandemic is humility and how much we don’t know.”
An open-ended question is the impact of delays in coronavirus testing processing. People in Massachusetts and across the country often wait up to a week or more to learn the results of their COVID-19 tests, making it difficult for leaders to stay ahead of leak cases and control future outbreaks.
The delays are largely due to delays at some of the nation’s largest labs, which process many of the tests from Massachusetts community health centers and businesses. Labs are struggling to keep up with demand caused by the growing cases of coronavirus in the southern and western states.
The state Department of Health said last week that the current state average for response times in Massachusetts in July is 2.2 days and that the state is monitoring the situation. However, there may be significant variation, as it includes both generally faster facilities that have internal testing capabilities and those that rely on supported national diagnostic companies.
“We know that the data we are obtaining is not the fault of [the state Health Department] It is delayed because of the delay in processing the tests, “said Rosman of the state medical association.” We need to be vigilant for small changes in the data. “
Travis Andersen and Jaclyn Reiss of the Globe staff contributed to this report.
She can be reached with Kay Lazar at [email protected] Follow her on Twitter @GlobeKayLazar. Dasia Moore can be contacted at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @daijmoore
