People Bucking COVID-19 Precautions, Driving MA's Surge: Report

As Massachusetts struggles to contain a fast-growing wave of coronavirus cases, a new report suggests people aren't taking some pandemic precautions as seriously as they once were.

People are gathering indoors with people they don't live with and going to restaurants and gyms more often, according to the report, which suggests those behaviors are contributing to the resurgence of COVID-19 cases.

The report was published Friday by a team of primarily consisting of Northeastern University researchers.

"Our data confirm a substantial relaxation of many of the behaviors that helped slow the spread of the disease in the spring," the report reads.

An October survey showed 45 percent of people who responded said they have seen people they don't live with indoors in the last 24 hours — more than double the number in an April survey.

The spring survey also found less than 5 percent of respondents said they went to a restaurant in the past 24 hours, a number that has grown 15 percent. The percent of respondents who reported going to a gym in the previous day jumped from 1 to 7 percent.

Many restaurants and gyms were closed in the spring.

The report said the data indicates residents have the power to cut into the coronavirus surge if they change the way they go about living heading into the holiday season.

"The good news, and the bad news, is that human behavior is likely driving the resurgence," the report said. "This means that infections need not continue to explode in Massachusetts, but also that real changes in behavior (and policy) may be required to bring it back under control."

The report did say Massachusetts ranked among the best states in wearing masks. About 80 percent of respondents said they closely follow mask guidelines.

There have been more than 184,000 reported coronavirus cases in Massachusetts since the start of the pandemic. Monday's daily report showed 781 people hospitalized with the virus, nearly 200 more than a week prior.

"Indeed, it is possible that some measures, such as limiting the hours restaurants are open, might actually make matters worse, because it may result in more people being in a restaurant at any given hour," the report said wrote. "More aggressive action now might avoid more draconian measures later, when our hospitals are beyond capacity."

This article originally appeared on the Boston Patch