With COVID cases steadily increasing in East Boston and the rest of the city due to a new, more contagious variant, the Boston Public Health Commission (BPHC) last week recommended residents take precautions to stop the spread and get vaccinated and/or boosted.
According to the most recent statistics, 1 out of every 10 Eastie residents tested for the virus were found to be positive and the citywide rate is almost 9 percent.
Last week, 1,086 Eastie residents were tested for the virus last week and 10.7 percent were positive–this was a 24 percent increase from the 8.6 percent that tested positive as reported by the BPHC on May 2.
One hundred sixteen additional Eastie residents contracted the virus between May 2 and May 9 and there are now 15,166 confirmed cases in the neighborhood since the start of the pandemic.
Boston’s citywide weekly positive test rate also increased last week and is now close to 9 percent.
According to the BPHC 17,476 residents were tested citywide last week and 8.8 percent were COVID positive–this was a 13 percent increase from the 7.8 percent that reportedly tested positive for the week ending on May 2.
The statistics released by the BPHC as part of its weekly COVID19 report breaks down the number of cases and infection rates in each neighborhood. It also breaks down the number of cases by age, gender and race.
Citywide positive cases of coronavirus increased 1.7 percent last week and went from 178,291 to 181,346 confirmed cases since the start of the pandemic.
There was one additional death in Boston from the virus in the past week and the total number of COVID deaths is now at 1,459.