WESTFIELD- While the City of Westfield is experiencing a spike in the number of weekly new COVID-19 cases, the Town of Southwick and Westfield State University reported much lower numbers this week.
The Westfield Health Department reported 36 new COVID-19 cases this week with one additional death due to the disease. This brings the total to 622 cases and 59 deaths.
The Town of Southwick reported just one new COVID-19 case, bringing the total to 86 cases since the beginning of the pandemic. Just four people have passed away due to COVID-19 in Southwick.
Westfield State reported no new cases this week among students and staff on campus. The university held its second round of mandatory mass-testing for COVID-19 last weekend. Some of those tests were conducted before the University released itsweekly results on Thursday last week, meaning those tests were included in last week’s tally.
Nonetheless, the 1,298 additional tests conducted this week revealed no new cases. Of the 5,840 tests taken at Westfield State so far, just five were positive in the opening weeks of the semester.
The mixed numbers locally come as the state is experiencing what appears to be a second wave of COVID-19 infections. On multiple days this week the percent positivity rate topped five percent. Thursday’s statewide case count was 986, the highest daily count since the spring. That day also showed a percent positive rate of 5.4 percent.
The average daily percent positive rate throughout the state this week was 4.1 percent, an increase from last week’s 3.9 percent.
