Worcester County sees spike in COVID-19 positivity rate

WORCESTER COUNTY, Md. – The Worcester County Health Department says they are working to lower their positivity rate after a recent spike. “Those numbers – that spike – is a result of both higher population in the summer as well as really expanded testing,” said Public Affairs Officer Travis Brown.

Brown says the spike could have been caused by the increased amount of people visiting Worcester County in the summer season. “We have seen a huge influx of people coming into Worcester. That is very common for us, especially this  time of year. We are a seasonal resort community. Our population just sky rockets during the summer months,” said Brown.

The Worcester County Health Department also says expanded testing could be the cause. “We do think a large percentage of the spike that we saw was due to aggressively expanding testing. It’s something that – over the past four to five weeks in particular – we have really ramped up testing availability for residents and visitors,” said Brown.

 Brown says the health department is putting a big focus on contact tracing. “Contact tracing is a huge part of what we do here. It has been since the beginning of this. I think we’ve got one of the hardest working nursing departments in the state of Maryland and maybe the world. They are doing a great job following up with every case,” said Brown.

The Worcester County Health Department says it has a team of workers who have been keeping track of positive cases and monitoring those peoples’ symptoms.