Health officials are warning that travel from the Thanksgiving holiday could worsen the surge of COVID-19 cases.
Doctors and health experts will be keeping a close eye on coronavirus metrics over the next couple of weeks, as they expect a rise in cases after Thanksgiving.
"I don't want to frighten people, except to say it is not too late at all for us to do something about this as we travel back, to be careful," Dr. Anthony Fauci said over the weekend.
After the number of COVID-19 cases surpassed 13 million in the U.S., there is growing concern that holiday travel and gatherings will be a recipe for another pandemic setback.
Health experts continue to urge people to take proper precautions including wearing a mask, maintaining proper hygiene and keeping physical distance from others.
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Anyone who traveled outside of Massachusetts for Thanksgiving is required to quarantine for two weeks or provide a negative test result, per state guidelines. Violators could be fined $500.
Travelers from states that aren't on the low-risk list must fill out the Massachusetts Travel Form as well. That includes anyone who's coming from one of the low-risk states but stayed "for more than a transitory period of time in the last 14 days" in a higher-risk state.
The American Automobile Association estimated 50 million Americans would travel for Thanksgiving despite urgent health warnings from officials.
And while highways weren’t packed this weekend, that didn’t mean people weren’t traveling. The Transportation Security Administration said it processed more than 7 million travelers over the past week -- the busiest days this year. That amount is still half that of an average year.
“I’m just expecting that we’ll see the numbers of cases go up in the next few weeks," said Kim Neimi, who stayed home for Thanksgiving.
Massachusetts health officials reported just over 2,500 new confirmed coronavirus cases on Sunday, as the average positivity rate continues to climb toward 4%.
The 2,501 new confirmed positive cases brings the total to 217,163 in the state since the start of the pandemic, according to the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.
Forty-six new deaths were also reported, meaning 10,487 in all have died in Massachusetts. There have been another 235 deaths among probable cases of COVID-19 at this time.
