Six new coronavirus cases reported on Nantucket Wednesday – The Inquirer and Mirror

(April 14, 2021) Six new coronavirus cases were reported on Nantucket Wednesday morning, increasing to 1,453 the total number of positive tests on the island since the pandemic began.

The results also included 90 negatives. Thirty-eight COVID-19 cases have been reported on the island in the past seven days, a 6.7 percent weekly positivity rate.

There have been five COVID-19 Nantucket deaths since the start of the pandemic, the most recent April 7 a woman in her mid-50s.

Health director Roberto Santamaria attributed the recent spike in cases to the probable presence on the island of more contagious coronavirus variants, and community spread.

More powerful variants of the COVID-19 virus have been recently confirmed in Massachusetts, and evidence of the U.K. variant has turned up in island sewage tested for coronavirus (Click herefor story).

We have to assume this spread is being caused by variants, Santamaria said. And now we are seeing with the nice weather and coming into the shoulder season people are getting lax in their safety measures like mask-wearing and distancing.

"We're seeing more people sicker, and more people in our emergency room now presenting with symptoms more severe than just what we'd been seeing at the drive-through testing," Nantucket Cottage Hospital president and CEO Gary Shaw said last week.

Click hereto read Shaw's full statement on the recent surge.

Shaw also attributed the recent spike in part to new arrivals on the island.

"We're seeing a greater number of people coming from other parts of the country for seasonal work, not knowing they are infected, getting tested and testing positive," he said.

"We are not out of the woods by any means. A good part of the country and the world are not vaccinated at a time when people really want to travel. Levels of decline have plateaued within the state. Thats a bad sign. A ramp-up in caseload is going to be coming," he continued..

"We all need to be vigilant to cross this hurdle. Its a race to get vaccines into arms. We are havinganother surge, and we need to be careful."

"Our biggest line of defense is you working together with us to help prevent the spread of this heinous virus. We are in the 24th mile of a full marathon. The end is near, but we cant quit now," Santamaria said in a recent Twitter message.

The second round of Phase 2 vaccinations began in early March, and vaccination of the general public is scheduled to begin April 19. (Click here for story). The vaccination site was closed Monday and Tuesday, however, because the town did not receive as many doses of vaccine as it had requested from the state (Click here for story).

As of Monday, 6,346 first doses and 3,934 second doses of COVID-19 vaccine have been administered on Nantucket.

All COVID-19 testing is now being conducted at the hospital's 57 Prospect St. drive-through portico to free up additional vaccination space at the New South Road VFW. Testing hours for those with symptoms and close contacts will be held from 7 a.m.-10 a.m. Monday-Friday.

COVID-19 elective testing for asymptomatic patients (those with no symptoms) will be held from 10 a.m.-noon Monday-Friday and 8 a.m.-10 a.m. Saturdays.Click hereto read more.

Hospital staff have collected 30,511 nasal swabs for testing since the start of the pandemic last March. In addition to the 1,453 positive tests 4.76 percent of the total number returned 29,053 have come back negative, and five are awaiting results.

The Nantucket Board of Health on Dec. 11, 2020 established a COVID-19 task force to better enforce and raise awareness of coronavirus regulations (Click herefor story).

Gov. Charlie Baker in late Februry lifted the 9:30 p.m. statewide restaurant closing time, and in early March increased capcacity limits for restaurants, theaters, museums and other indoor locations. Additional capacity increases took effect March 22 (Click herefor story).

Part-time in-class learning for Nantucket public-school students resumed Jan. 14 after being remote only since before Christmas. Full in-class learning for elementary-school students began April 5, with middle- and high-school students scheduled to return full-time later this month.

"I ask everyone on Nantucket to take personal responsibility and do all you can to reduce the potential for transmission in our community. That means wearing masks, staying physically distant, washing your hands, and not hosting or attending gatherings with people outside your immediate households," Shaw said recently.

"Most of all, we want our community to stay healthy, we want our economy to remain open, we want our public schools to be able to return to in-person learning. To that end, we must work together and apply the simple preventive measures that will keep this situation from spiraling out of control."

There have been 1,387 coronavirus cases confirmed on Nantucket in the past seven months, beginning Sept. 9, 2020 with a spike linked to workers in the trades, followed by a second surge in late September tied to a church function in which a communal meal was shared.

A third spike in early November was again tied to workers in the trades, followed by significant surges related to holiday gatherings and travel at Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's. A moderate surge in early March was tied to school-break-related travel.

Prior to Sept. 9, Nantucket had one of the lowest COVID-19 rates in the state per 100,000 population, and the fewest confirmed cases of any county in Massachusetts.

The Board of Health on Oct. 6, 2020 voted to require all people on publicly-accessible property across the island to wear a mask, not just downtown and in Sconset, as was previously mandated.

It decided in mid-November against tightening restrictions to limit the total number of workers on a job site to six in an attempt to stop the spread (Click herefor story).

Nantucket Cottage Hospital does not have an intensive-care unit and only five ventilators. Shaw has said patients in need of acute respiratory care would be transferred to mainland hospitals if at all possible.

The criteria for symptomatic drive-up testing at the hospital includes at least one of the following signs or symptoms consistent with a viral respiratory syndrome: subjective/documented fever, new sore throat, new cough, new runny nose/nasal congestion, new shortness of breath, new muscle aches or anosmia (new loss of sense of smell). Close contacts of COVID-19 positive patients and pre-procedure patients can also be tested.

For more information about symptomatic and asymptomatic testing,click here.

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Six new coronavirus cases reported on Nantucket Wednesday - The Inquirer and Mirror