As COVID-19 cases in Massachusetts continue to rise, the wastewater data shows signs of a spike — and a dip — in the latest report.
But the slight recession doesn’t seem to be convincing medical experts just yet. Three top Boston doctors spoke to NBC10 Boston during the weekly “COVID Q&A” series about COVID levels in wastewater data. The doctors said that more time is needed to get the real perspective of the data.
Dr. Shira Doron of Tufts Medical Center said there is reason to be skeptical about the recent mild recession.
“In Boston sewage, there seems to be a steady downward trend. (However), there is a caveat with sewage declining. It has been suggested that the only way to see a sewage viral level falsely low is if people aren’t using the toilets, and that could happen if people are out during the school vacation week.”
Dr. Daniel Kuritzkes of Brigham and Women’s Hospital echoed that sentiment.
“You want to be able to control how much human fecal matter is in the wastewater by quantifying human DNA and controlling it that way,” he said.
The COVID sewage data appeared to have peaked in early April, when levels rose to around 700 copies per milliliter, but has since dropped to around 500 copies per milliliter.
Dr. Sabrina Assoumou of the Boston Medical Center said that while the recession is a positive, cases statewide remain high.
“It’s encouraging to see that it seems to be peaking, so I think time will tell,” he said. “But I think we have to underscore that if you look at Massachusetts, the test positivity rate is almost 5%, so even if we hit the peak, we have to remember there are going to be a lot of cases where we go down from that level”. peak, so it’s still a time to be vigilant.
All three doctors said they want to see more consistency in the way the numbers move.
Assoumou noted that many people are testing through home kits and that is not being reported to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which could skew the numbers.
“There is data that came out from the CDC that estimated that during the wave of omicron, about 20% of people who had COVID were getting rapid tests at home,” he said. “There’s no mandatory reporting of home testing, so we need to find a way to incentivize people to report home testing so we can get a better estimate of what’s going on in the home.” community”.
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