MA COVID-19 Cases, Hospitalizations Rise — But Still Much Lower Than 2022

MASSACHUSETTS — Several data sources tracking local COVID-19 cases have shown an increase in recent weeks, but health officials caution that virus levels are still much smaller than in previous years.

COVID-19 hospitalizations rose for the second consecutive week as of July with 179 people being treated for the virus. Hospitalizations had been dropping for months up until around July 8, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data.

During the same late-July period in 2022, there were over 700 people hospitalized in Massachusetts due to the virus, according to the CDC data.

The Massachusetts Water Resources Authority also showed an upward bent in COVID-19 samples in wastewater in both the southern area, which spans Framingham to Hingham, and the northern area from Wilmington to Boston. The levels had ticked up to where the region was in March, but were still lower than July 2022.

The Upper Blackstone Clean Water wastewater monitoring, which covers the Worcester area, showed COVID-19 levels at a high also not seen since the beginning of March. Those levels were still less than half of what they were in July 2022.

The Walgreens COVID-19 Index, which uses in-store testing results, showed that Massachusetts positive test results increased about 20 percent from between July 23 and July 30. That data is based on only a handful of tests, however.

Coronavirus testing has changed in Massachusetts since the earlier years of the pandemic, which may make surges harder to track. Rapid at-home tests have largely taken the place of nasal swab tests, especially since the state closed its testing sites earlier this year. The state ended the COVID-19 health emergency in early May.

Nationwide, COVID-19 hospitalizations topped 8,000 last week for the first time since May, according to the CDC. Hospitalizations were over 44,000 in the U.S. at the end of July 2022.

University of Minnesota director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy Dr. Michael Osterholm told the Boston Globe it's too early to tell if there's a larger upswing coming due to small testing sample sizes.

"We have to be very careful about interpreting the increases in smaller numbers and comparing that to what’s happened in the past with large surges," he said.