Hope Seen In Declining Worcester Coronavirus Numbers

WORCESTER, MA — The second wave of the coronavirus pandemic may be on the wane in Worcester.

The city added 550 cases over the last week. That's 58 higher than the previous week, but still much lower than when the city was adding around 1,200 cases per week in January. The city's positive test rate is also now below 20 percent.

"This is really hopefully back to the range we were [before] this second surge," Worcester City Manager Edward Augustus Jr. said Thursday.

Another sign the second wave may have peaked: the number of health care workers testing positive at the Saint Vincent and UMass Memorial hospitals has dropped "precipitously" in recent weeks, Worcester Health Director Michael Hirsh said. For example, in the week ending Jan. 7, 164 health care workers tested positive for the virus. Seventy-five tested positive over the week ending Thursday.

As of Thursday, the number of patients at the DCU Center field hospital was down to 20. The field hospital had 53 patients one month ago.

The decline in cases comes as Worcester prepares to open a vaccine supersite on Tuesday. The site at Worcester State University will be open five days per week, and will begin by vaccinating about 500 people per day. Officials hope the site will ramp up to 2,000 vaccinations per day at some point.

Worcester has given out 4,567 vaccine doses to eligible groups at a site at the Worcester Senior Center. Of those, 3,414 are first doses and 708 are second doses.