Massachusetts Records 145 COVID-19 Deaths Over 3 Days; 7,120 New Cases

Health officials in Massachusetts recorded more than 140 COVID-19 deaths over the past three days even as the state’s coronavirus cases and hospitalizations continue to fall.

Between Jan. 22 and 24, Massachusetts reported 145 additional COVID-19 deaths, raising the state’s death toll to 21,107. It is unclear how many of the people who died were vaccinated. It is also unclear whether any of them had pre-existing medical conditions.

During the same period, at least 7,120 residents also tested positive for COVID-19, bringing Massachusetts’ total number of coronavirus infections to 1,449,781, state data showed. The Department of Health did not specify the number of breakthrough infections in reported figures.

Despite the rising number of COVID-19 deaths, infections in Massachusetts have begun to decline sharply. As of Tuesday, the state’s seven-day average of daily confirmed cases fell to 10,657 — at least half the peak of 22,451 reported on Jan. 11.

Over the past two weeks, case rates have also fallen by 21%, according to an analysis of data conducted by CNN.

As of Jan. 19, the state’s seven-day rolling average of positivity dropped to 17.88% from a high of 26.04% on Jan. 9.

Hospitalization rates in Massachusetts have been declining in recent days. However, it has not fallen at the same rate as COVID-19 infections. On Tuesday, 2,688 were hospitalized with COVID-19. The figures are a 19% decrease from 3,306 on Jan. 14.

The declining figures in hospitalizations and cases could signify that the Omicron variant, which caused a surge of COVID-19 infections through the holiday season, has peaked in the state. However, health experts warn that death rates would unlikely come down in the coming weeks.

“It takes a few weeks after cases peak for hospitalizations to peak and then a few weeks after that for deaths to peak. So we reached the peak in cases earlier and are now just starting to see the impact on reduced hospitalizations,” Matthew Fox, a professor of epidemiology and global health at Boston University School of Public Health, said in an e-mail to The Boston Globe. “Deaths won’t come down for another few weeks, though we hope earlier.”

The United States has reported 72,171,187 COVID-19 cases and 871,934 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic, according to Johns Hopkins University data.