Brookline In COVID 'Yellow' Zone After Weeks Of Being 'Green'

BROOKLINE, MA — Brookline's risk of spreading the coronavirus rose to moderate, or yellow, after hovering since mid-February in the green, or low risk category, according to state data released Thursday.

But that news comes as more than a third of Brookline residents — 40 percent or 25,959 people — have gotten at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine, and more than a quarter, or 26 percent, of residents have been fully vaccinated.

It was the average daily rate that pushed Brookline into the moderate risk category. During the past two weeks the rate went up to 10.8 per 100,000 people from 9.9 the week before. Some 108 tests came back positive during the past two weeks up from 99 the week before. The town's positive test rate over the past two weeks stayed under 1 percent, according to the town-by-town state data. Brookline's was 0.87 percent, up from 0.80 in last week's report.

>>MA Town-By-Town Coronavirus Stats: Declines Across All Metrics

But across the state, the data is looking much more hopeful: Massachusetts reported a slight decrease in the number of high-risk communities in the latest town-by-town report Thursday, labeling 59 communities as high risk for the coronavirus, down from 77 in the previous report.

The seven-day average positive test rate for the state fell from 2.43 percent last week to 2.3 percent. The weekly average case rate, hospitalization and death rate also fell: The seven-day average death rate of 8.1 is the lowest on record.

The latest vaccine report shows the number of residents who are fully vaccinated has risen to 1.9 million. Another 1.2 million have received one dose of the Moderna or Pfizer vaccine.

Gov. Charlie Baker has said that Massachusetts would need to get to more than 4 million people vaccinated to achieve "herd immunity" in the state.