Rt measures the "acceleration" of the infection. When you're down to a fairly flat ~150 cases per day then by definition Rt is going to be around 1. Also note that the reported daily case totals include backdated tests and when sorted by date, you'll see a steady decline and MA is pretty much flat now (see page 2 & 4 of [0]).
A state that was reporting 10 cases a day consistently would have an Rt of 1.0, if they reported 11, then the Rt would be 1.1. Similarly, VT which has an Rt of 1.07 despite only reporting 5 new cases yesterday as they are bouncing around in the single digits to low teens -- seems like it's basically noise now affecting the Rt there at this point.
It is going to be quite difficult to get it to zero in MA without closing the state borders. Logan Airport had 203,328 passengers through it in May 2020 [1], that's an average of 6777/day, at a 2% positivity rate that could be 135 cases a day right there (not including tens of thousands of people driving into the state, although our neighbors are in similar situations to MA rate-wise).
It's worth noting that MA has recently opened up testing to anyone who wants it so we're likely picking up more asymptomatic cases now. At this point contact-tracing is going to be key although they've had to lay off [2] many of the tracers due to lack of work for them.
The state continues to do well, we've had restaurants open (indoor and outdoor dining) for several weeks now, gyms have been open for a week (except Boston opened gyms yesterday) and 4th July was 10 days ago. The state tested 17K protestors [3] in June and only found a 2.5% positive rate (which was the same as the state-wide rate at the time).
We'll see, but I'm hopeful and will continue to do my part; distancing & masks in public.
A state that was reporting 10 cases a day consistently would have an Rt of 1.0, if they reported 11, then the Rt would be 1.1. Similarly, VT which has an Rt of 1.07 despite only reporting 5 new cases yesterday as they are bouncing around in the single digits to low teens -- seems like it's basically noise now affecting the Rt there at this point.
It is going to be quite difficult to get it to zero in MA without closing the state borders. Logan Airport had 203,328 passengers through it in May 2020 [1], that's an average of 6777/day, at a 2% positivity rate that could be 135 cases a day right there (not including tens of thousands of people driving into the state, although our neighbors are in similar situations to MA rate-wise).
It's worth noting that MA has recently opened up testing to anyone who wants it so we're likely picking up more asymptomatic cases now. At this point contact-tracing is going to be key although they've had to lay off [2] many of the tracers due to lack of work for them.
The state continues to do well, we've had restaurants open (indoor and outdoor dining) for several weeks now, gyms have been open for a week (except Boston opened gyms yesterday) and 4th July was 10 days ago. The state tested 17K protestors [3] in June and only found a 2.5% positive rate (which was the same as the state-wide rate at the time).
We'll see, but I'm hopeful and will continue to do my part; distancing & masks in public.
[0] https://www.mass.gov/doc/covid-19-dashboard-july-13-2020/dow...
[1] http://www.massport.com/media/4100/0520-avstats-airport-traf...
[2] https://www.bostonmagazine.com/news/2020/06/29/covid-contact...
[3] https://www.masslive.com/coronavirus/2020/06/after-black-liv...