CONNECTICUT, USA — As people across Connecticut return to school and work after holiday gatherings, urgent care centers are filling up with people testing positive for COVID-19. All eight counties now fall on the CDC’s medium- to high-alert for COVID, places where hospitalizations are the highest.
“So, what that means, the CDC recommends that anyone living in these orange, high categories, they may want to consider wearing a mask at any indoor events out in public,” said Chris Boyle, Spokesman for the Connecticut Department of Public Health, which encourages people living in Middlesex, New Haven, Litchfield, and Fairfield counties to heed the CDC’s advice and mask up indoors.
Adding, “We recommend wearing a mask if indoors, in public. Get tested if you have symptoms and stay home if you have symptoms and please stay up to date on your vaccine, especially that updated booster.”
In New Haven, officials passed out free COVID-19 test kits on a rainy New Years' Eve. In Hartford, Charter Oak Health Center treats patients with respiratory symptoms seven days a week at its Urgent Care Center. That facility alone, in the Frog Hollow neighborhood, is seeing a 31 percent COVID infection rate.
Dr. Luis Federico Diez believes the rate is even higher because many people test at home and don’t self-report.
“The best thing to do is get your vaccine, wear your mask when you are inside with another group of people,” said Diez, who also said the latest sub-variant is more transmissive, but symptoms tend to be milder.
The latest booster became available back in September and is touted for its effectiveness against this sub-variant. You can get the booster at least two months after your primary vaccine or your last booster.
“I actually got my third booster already and if you haven’t gotten one already, you should because the most recent one has a strain that is closer to the infections that we have right now,” said Diaz.
Before Thanksgiving, Connecticut’s COVID positivity rate was below 10 percent. On Jan. 2, it’s around 17 percent and that could grow higher.
“I would expect the rate to a tad higher over the course of this week as people come back and get back to their activities. And I would think after the holiday rush we would start to see a downslope,” said Dr. Paul Anthony, assistant director of infectious diseases at Hartford Healthcare.
Samaia Hernandez is a reporter for FOX61 News. She can be reached at shernandez@fox61.com. Follow her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
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