This insight was brought to you by WBUR's caption, "Flu-related hospitalizations spike in Massachusetts earlier than last winter."
Source: https://www.wbur.org/news/2026/01/06/massachusetts-boston-severe-flu-season-altman
Discussion
Loading...
Let's hope that this spike in flu hospitalizations in #Massachusetts will be followed by an equally swift decline
(thus aligning with my personal, wrong definition of "spike")
But considering that, over 2+ hours at MGH today, more patients were wearing masks than staff
--
the institution's "High levels of respiratory virus activity policy" of "Your care team and other staff will wear a facility-issued face mask during direct interactions with patients in patient rooms and other clinical care areas where direct care is provided" notwithstanding
--
I am not optimistic
Two further observations:
1 the "higher" the staff member, the less likely to wear a mask. Two MDs in the exam room - no mask. Staffers who might have been nurses or medical assistants? Maybe 1/3 surgical masks, 2/3 nothing. Receptionists, schedulers, people managing waiting rooms: 50-50.
2 the ventilation with outdoor air was pretty good throughout the Yawkey building EXCEPT for the lobby. On the way in, we passed through the lobby quickly. On the way out, there was a really long parking payment line in the lobby, so enough waiting time for the CO2 monitor in my purse to take readings. The increase ("spike," hah) you see in the pic started when I got to the lobby (*not* just when I got to the basement parking elevators). Maybe the cafe in the Yawkey lobby uses gas burners? Maybe the parking structure elevator shaft lets car exhaust into the lobby? Or maybe the people who designed the building didn't size the lobby ventilation to cope with 60 people in the parking line as well as everyone else using the lobby cafe etc.... Whatever the reason, it was a big difference from the rest of the building.
