The Provincetown Select Board has unanimously voted to enact an emergency indoor mask mandate — effective immediately in the Massachusetts town — in the wake of a COVID-19 cluster that has hundreds of positive associated cases.

The Select Board made the vote during a joint emergency meeting with the Provincetown Board of Health Sunday evening.

On July 19, Provincetown officials issued a mask advisory that asked people to wear masks indoors when social distancing could not be achieved.

During the emergency meeting, the Select Board and Board of Health also voted to grant additional authority to Town Manager Alex Morse.

On Saturday, Morse shared via Facebook that the Massachusetts Department of Public Health is reporting that at least 430 confirmed COVID-19 cases are associated with the Provincetown cluster. Of these cases, 342 are Massachusetts residents and 153 of those people reside in Provincetown. The remainder of those who tested positive reside in other states.

In his previous update last Wednesday, Morse said at least 256 confirmed coronavirus cases were associated with the cluster.

This content is imported from Twitter.
You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site.

During Sunday’s emergency meeting, Morse said that the DPH has granted an extension on the daily Fallon PCR testing and daily administration of COVID-19 vaccines that started on July 14. Those measures were slated to continue through Friday, July 30, and they have been extended for two weeks through Aug. 13.

Morse did note, however, that Provincetown is starting to see a decline in its daily positivity rate and the town has resumed wastewater surveillance efforts. The positivity rate has dropped to 9% from the peak rate of 15%.

Morse’s update on Saturday came a day after the DPH confirmed that the delta COVID-19 variant was detected in the Provincetown cluster.

According to Morse, cases associated with the cluster among Massachusetts residents are found to be predominantly symptomatic (71%) with 69% of affected individuals reporting that they are fully vaccinated against COVID-19.

“The unvaccinated, they were probably much rarer, actually, than the vaccinated, and yet, they make up a third of the infections,” said Dr. Shira Doron, the hospital epidemiologist at Tufts Medical Center in Boston.

Doron says that unvaccinated people likely caused the delta COVID-19 variant to spread among the thousands of people who have visited Provincetown.

“If it was ever going to happen, it was going to happen there with crowded nightclubs, a rainy weekend with a lot of indoor time, and, apparently, quite a lot of unvaccinated people showing up,” Doron said.

Morse said apart from three hospitalizations — two in-state and one out-of-state — associated with the Provincetown cluster, symptoms are known to be mild and without complication.

The cluster comes as discussions continue about whether COVID-19 booster shots are necessary for fully vaccinated people in the United States. Since the vast majority of breakthrough cases are mild and since data has not suggested immunity is waning over time, Doron says boosters are not needed at this time.

“If it’s a mild infection, if it’s a common cold or a flu, does that justify going around and giving everybody another round of shots when the rest of the world hasn’t had their first shot?” Doron said.

Doron says it is important to get people around the world vaccinated against COVID-19 to help put an end to mutating variants.

Massachusetts COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations and fatalities

Massachusetts vaccination progress