NORTHAMPTON — Holyoke and many cities and towns in Hampshire County are seeing a rise in COVID-19 cases, according to town-by-town data the state Department of Public Health releases weekly on Thursdays.
Based on the data from the last two weeks, Southampton fell into the “red” category, with 29 cases in the past two weeks and a positivity rate of 5.52%. Granby, with 26 cases, and Holyoke, which were already in that category, remained in the red. For communities with fewer than 10,000 residents, red signifies more than 25 cases in a two-week period.
In the last two weeks, Holyoke had 384 cases, Northampton had 49 cases, Easthampton had 68 cases, and South Hadley had 59 cases. Case numbers in those municipalities are the highest they have been in months. Amherst had 103 cases, which was a decrease from the previous two-week period.
Every Massachusetts town is listed in the report, which can be found on the mass.gov website.
In total, Hampshire County has reported 483 cases of the highly infectious respiratory illness in the last two weeks — the highest number of cases the county has seen since at least summer, according to a comparison with data from previous week’s state reports compiled by the Public Health Institute of Western Massachusetts.
In the past two weeks, 46 people in Hampden County have died of COVID-19, while six people in Hampshire County have died, according to the state’s report published Thursday.
Statewide, hospital admissions for COVID-19 across Massachusetts are also on the rise, according to the state’s report.
A vast majority of the COVID-19 “clusters” identified by the state between Nov. 8 and Dec. 5 were in households – 12,583 household clusters were identified, comprising a total of 31,921 cases. Long-term care facilities had the second-highest number of clusters in the same period, with 150 clusters identified and a total of 1,437 cases.
Greta Jochem can be reached at gjochem@gazettenet.com