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Boston's Morning Newsletter
Why local doctors are calling for the public's help combatting RSV
Editor's Note: This is an excerpt from WBUR's daily morning newsletter, WBUR Today. If you like what you read and want it in your inbox, sign up here.
Don’t look now, but the holiday season is nearly upon us. Our seasonal joy newsletter, The Pick Me Up, returns this Monday. Thanksgiving is just a week from today. And the official Boston Common Christmas tree has begun its journey from Nova Scotia — although we might have to send it back if it keeps making puns like this.
A trio of top doctors groups in Massachusetts is urging all residents to consider wearing masks in crowded indoor spaces, getting their COVID and flu vaccines and keeping their kids home, even if they seem a little sick, due to a rise in RSV cases that’s “stretching capacity in emergency departments and hospitals.”
- The backstory: we went over the basics of this fall’s RSV surge and its impacts on local hospitals in this newsletter last month — and the trend has only continued. Doctors at Mass General Brigham told WBUR’s Priyanka Dayal McCluskey last week that they saw a thousand patients with RSV — which is usually mild but can be serious for babies — across the network in one week.
- Now, the three physician groups — the Massachusetts Medical Society, the local chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Massachusetts Academy of Family Physicians — are concerned to the point that they’re asking for the public’s help.
- Their other recommendations include practicing good basic hygiene, like hand washing and not sneezing into your hand. Their mask recommendation also goes further than the state’s official COVID-19 guidance, which only advises face coverings for those at high risk of severe disease due to age or a medical condition. (Whether there’s broad public appetite for the masking recommendations remains to be seen.)
- Taken together, the groups say these mitigation measures will both “lessen the burden on our overstressed health care system” as we enter the holidays and help keep kids from missing school.
Better late than never: We may find out the official opening date for the second, longer leg of the Green Line Extension this morning. Ever since the postponement this past summer, the five-stop branch through Somerville into Medford has been slated to open in “late November.” According to MBTA spokesman Joe Pesaturo, the T’s general manager, Steve Poftak, plans to “provide an update” on the project at a Board of Directors meeting at 9 a.m. today.
- Could it be another delay? That’s unclear. Some local GLX liaisons told The Boston Globe earlier this week that they’ve heard the MBTA plans to stick to the “late November” timeline. Still, it will be nearly a year after the branch was originally scheduled to open, due to the effects of the pandemic and MBTA staffing shortages.
The Newton judge accused of helping an undocumented immigrant flee ICE back in 2019 has been cleared to return to the bench. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court decided yesterday to reinstate Judge Shelley Joseph, after charges were dropped in September.
Haverhill High School is canceling the rest of its football season over a hazing incident involving “some members” of the team. That means the schools is forfeiting the rest of their games and putting the coaching staff on paid leave while local police investigate.
- According to Boston 25 News, a leaked video showed three teenagers — one in a Haverhill football shirt — dragging another individual across a floor and sexually harassing him.
It looks like President Joe Biden will be keeping his Nantucket Thanksgiving tradition alive this year. The Nantucket Current reports the Biden family is expected to arrive on the island this coming Tuesday — and preparations are already underway (i.e. a very big Air Force plane unloading government vehicles and personnel).
- You can read an excerpt here from Biden’s memoir about his love for Nantucket and his Thanksgiving tradition dating back to 1975.
P.S.— Did you miss (or not have time to read) the investigation we published yesterday on the hidden costs Massachusetts homebuyers incur due to the lightly regulated title insurance industry? Not to worry! Here are five takeaways from the story you should know, especially if buying a new home is on your horizon.
