Could Travel Over February Vacation Lead to MA COVID-19 Spike?

Declining COVID-19 numbers across Massachusetts indicate that we could see some sense of normalcy return to our lives this year - IF things continue in this direction.

However, some officials are expressing new concerns that travel over the February school break could lead to a surge in cases as students return to school. Schools across the state are preparing or have already welcomed children back to the classroom either in hybrid or full in-person learning.

Districts across Massachusetts are taking precautions to make sure students and staff members are healthy before returning to the classroom. Many school districts are requiring students and staff to get tested if they have traveled out of the state.

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Gov. Baker and other state officials have continually urged residents to avoid traveling, but if your social media news feed looked anything like mine last week, plenty of people ignored warnings.

Testing facilities have seen an uptick in testing over the past few days as people have arrived back from out-of-state travel, but any trend in positives tests won't be clear for about another 10 days according to Boston News25.

Dr. David Rosman, the president of the Massachusetts Medical Society, told NBC News 10 testing is exactly what the public should be doing, regardless of travel.

“I think whether you played by the rules or not, during vacation you probably interacted with more people in a different circle than you did anyway,” Rosman said. “What we want to make sure is coming back from school vacation isn’t the turning point where the numbers go back up.”