Massachusetts health officials reported another 5,007 new confirmed COVID-19 cases -- the third day in a row over 5,000 -- and 27 new deaths Friday.
The report from the Department of Public Health pushed the state's number of confirmed COVID-19 above 900,000 to 901,430 since the start of the pandemic and its death toll to 19,217. The state topped 800,000 cases on Nov. 4.
Friday's total is the third straight day above 5,000 -- the total on Thursday was the most new cases confirmed in one day since Jan. 16.
Massachusetts' COVID metrics, tracked on the Department of Public Health's interactive coronavirus dashboard, had been far lower than they were in spring, but have been rising lately. The discovery of omicron, a new COVID strain labeled a variant of concern by the World Health Organization over the Thanksgiving weekend, is being monitored in case it accelerates the recent surge statewide and across the U.S.
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Massachusetts' seven-day average of positive tests rose from 5.01% Thursday to 5.17% on Friday, its highest level since Jan. 21. The metric was once above 30%, but had dropped under 0.5% until the delta variant began surging in the state.
The number of patients in Massachusetts hospitals with confirmed COVID-19 cases ticked down to 1,238. The figure was once nearly 4,000, but reached under an average of 85 at one point in July.
Of those currently hospitalized, 411 are fully vaccinated, 266 are in intensive care units and 148 are intubated.
Nearly 11.9 million vaccine doses have now been administered in Massachusetts.
That includes, from the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines, just over 5.4 million first shots, more than 4.6 million second shots and over 1.5 million booster shots. There have been more than 332,000 doses of the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine administered.
Health officials on Friday reported that a total of 4,970,313 Massachusetts residents have been fully vaccinated.
