Walsh: Important to get coronavirus information out to public

BOSTON — Boston Mayor Marty Walsh is stressing the importance of informing the public about the coronavirus after the state’s first case was confirmed last week.

The CDC confirmed the first coronavirus case in the state, saying the sick person is a man in his 20s who is a student at UMass-Boston. The man had just returned to Boston from China on Tuesday. He had potential symptoms of the virus so he sought medical attention.

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The City of Boston says the man will remain isolated until cleared by public health officials.

As part of a federal mandate, only a handful of airports in the U.S. are now taking in flights from China. Boston is not one of those cities.

Walsh said he was alerted late Friday on the state’s first confirmed case and the information was released by the state on Saturday.

The mayor said he believes more information about a sick person’s activities should be made public so people have more information.

“I think that is important to potentially get out to the community. It’s important to get all the info out to the public right away because the public is going to be concerned: ‘Did I come into contact with someone who had the Coronavirus?’ And the fact that it doesn’t show up until two weeks later is also concerning to a lot of folks,” Walsh said.

When asked why the infected person’s activities are not being made public so people can determine if they were possibly exposed, Gov. Charlie Baker said at this time, risk for infection is “extremely low.”

“At this point and time, the risk for Coronavirus infection in MA is extremely low and based first-hand info on this particular individual, people are not particularly concerned about his travels once he got back to MA. He pretty much self quarantined himself when he got back," Baker said.

Walsh said right now there are no other cases or suspected cases in Boston. He believes narrowing down which cities can take flights from the highly-infected area will help.

“Not having airplanes landing in 50 different airports in the country is a big change in the situation,” Walsh said.

Right now Boston is not taking in flights from mainland China. Hong Kong flights are coming in and the governor says if someone complains of potential symptoms they will be screened.

Meanwhile, UMass-Boston Interim Chancellor Katherine S. Newman said in a campus statement Sunday that “there is low risk to the campus" following the confirmed case of one of its students having coronavirus.

“We are grateful that this young man sought medical attention immediately and greatly limited his contact with others. The student did not participate in any classes or campus activities last week,” Newman said. “I want to reiterate that that this individual is being isolated at an off-campus location, continues to recover well, and is checking in regularly by phone with public health nurses. He will remain isolated until health officials determine that he is no longer contagious. His few close contacts have been identified and are being monitored for any sign of symptoms.”

“Given the limited interaction between the student and our campus, the public health authorities indicate that there is low risk to the campus,” she said.

Parent Kendra Walton said the situation"makes you more concerned."

“We just do what we can to protect ourselves of flu shots and hand washing. That is all we have control over,” she said.

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