Boston-Proper COVID-19 Update (06-Jan-2023 data)

Using the cumulative cases by neighborhood from 2020 and 2021 (nope, this doesn't get old, the selection option for cumulative rates on the site reads "COVID-19 Cases and Rates by Neighborhood: Cumulative for 2020 and 2021 even in 2023) we can see that confirmed cases in Boston have come back up and by themselves would be concerning, despite being deceptive because most people are no longer testing in hospital settings, if at all.  The city-wide rate for the last week is 28 cases per 100k, which is roughly twice the threshold to reach the CDC's highest transmission rating.  But that doesn't give us the full picture as we've seen from wastewater tracking and the various threshold parameters Boston has in place.  In fact, the situation in Boston is now worse than any time other than during the Omicron wave in late December 2021/early January 2022.

Three thresholds for concern that had reached previously got progressively worse worse:
Test Positivity rate:
Threshold: 5.0%
Current:   14.6% (up from 13.0% last week and 10.3% the week before)

Number of neighborhoods with positivity rate >= 8.0%
Threshold: 4 or more (of 16 total)
Current:   15 (up from 14 last week and 11 the week before)

Confirmed Daily Adult COVID-19 Hospitalizations (7-day moving average)
Threshold: 200.0
Current:     287.7 (up from 271.9 last week and 233.9 the week week before)

Thankfully, while the occupied adult non-surge ICU beds got worse, it is still down from 2 weeks ago and remains below the threshold, if just barely:
Threshold: 95.0%
Current:     91.4% (up from 89.6% but still down from 93.7% the week before)

Also the 7-day average emergency department visits per day hasn't increased for 7 consecutive days... with that said...
November's full-month average: 280.6 (up from 216 the previous year)
December's full-month average: 324.4 (compared to 291.1 the previous year)
Number of days with average > 300 in November: 9 (only 5 prior to Thanksgiving) (there were ZERO days in November 2021 like this)
Number of days with average > 300 in December: 25 (there were only 11 in December 2021, the last 11 days)

All of this is to say that things continue to be pretty bad in Boston right now.  

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