Boston has released a new set of coronavirus metrics. Here’s what to know.
"All of this is in an effort to better understand COVID spread across the community."
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Boston has rolled out a new set of key coronavirus metrics officials say drive the city’s pandemic response as it experiences a surge in virus activity.
Chief of Health and Human Services Marty Martinez said Tuesday the city will now publish six pieces of core data two times a week on Wednesday and Saturday mornings.
“All of this is in an effort to better understand COVID spread across the community and … what (the numbers are) telling us about what we need to continue to focus on,” Martinez told reporters.
The data includes:
- The average number of daily new cases
- The community-level positivity rate
- The number of tests performed on average each day
- ICU bed capacity and the number of non-surge beds occupied
- The total number of hospital beds available (both medical and ICU beds)
- The average number of people per day visiting emergency rooms with COVID-19-like symptoms (in both confirmed and presumed cases)
Martinez said the city is also introducing a new, adjusted metric: community-level positivity rate.
“This adjusted measure … is looking at the total individuals tested over the last seven days and those who tested positive over the last seven days,” he said. “So that percentage will allow us to look at more recent community positivity and not cumulative (positivity) which is what we had been looking at.”
On Nov. 12, the latest day with nearly complete data recorded, the city saw 225 new positive tests and a cumulative citywide positivity rate of 9.6 percent, up from 83 positive tests and a rate of 5.3 percent nearly a month ago on Oct. 14. Over the summer, the city averaged a rate of 1.8 to 2.8 percent.
“Every metric tells us we’re in the midst of a significant and concerning increase of COVID activity here in the city and in the commonwealth of Massachusetts,” Mayor Marty Walsh said. “The daily cases we’re seeing are starting to look like the numbers we saw near our peak in April and May.”
Hospital admission rates are not at the same level as they were in the spring, but have still increased, Walsh said, emphasizing the need for residents to continue taking steps to limit virus spread.
The mayor also did not rule out taking more drastic measures to curtail the virus, including shutting down restaurants and other businesses again, although he said an economic shutdown would be a last resort.
“I don’t want to be standing in front of this podium three weeks from now shutting down restaurants and retail shops and businesses and sports and schools and everything that we’ve done,” Walsh said. “We don’t want to go backwards.”
In releasing the new data set, officials hope to give “the most current and comprehensive picture of the virus,” Walsh said.
“As we’ve said from the start to keep people safe and to contain the virus, we have to follow the science and we have to follow the data,” he said.
Here’s the first set of the new metrics released:
Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.
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