New COVID-19 Cases Plunging In Bucks County

BUCKS COUNTY, PA — Strong vaccination rates in Bucks County are credited for a steep decline in COVID-19 cases in Bucks County over the past month.

New infections are at their lowest rate in nearly a year, county health officials said Monday, due in no small part to the more than quarter-million county residents who have been fully vaccinated. More than half of residents have received at least one dose of the vaccine.

While there are still 19 patients hospitalized with COVID-19, none of them are on ventilators, officials said. The county reported eight COVID-19 deaths last week, and one death has been reported so far in June. Since the pandemic began last March, more than 1,300 Bucks County residents have died of COVID-19.

The county’s test positivity rate, which exceeded 17 percent a few months ago, is now down to 1.5 percent.

The weekly average of new cases in the four suburban Philadelphia counties — Bucks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery — has dropped more quickly than it has statewide, according to a recent Philadelphia Inquirer analysis. Counties with the highest vaccination rates have had some of the sharpest declines in new cases, the report also found.

Meanwhile, the county is winding down its mass vaccination sites, as the vaccine is now readily available at pharmacies, hospitals and pop-up clinics. By July 4, two clinics at the Perkasie and Newtown campuses of Bucks County Community College will close, leaving sites at Neshaminy Mall in Bensalem and the Warwick Square shopping center in Jamison.

All of the sites are available without appointments required, and are offering both the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine and the two-dose Pfizer vaccine.

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