Number of communities in the red climbs to 219

Chris Lisinski

The state continues to deem even more cities and towns as facing the highest risk level for COVID-19, with the count rising to 219 in the latest weekly update.

Data initially missing from the Department of Public Health’s dashboard on Thursday show that more than 62 percent of Massachusetts municipalities landed in the red, the most since the state launched its color-coded system for monitoring COVID threats this summer.

Since November 6, when the Baker administration changed the metrics for designating city and town risk levels to slightly higher thresholds with controls for population size, the number in the most worrisome level has exploded from 16 to 219.

In Thursday’s latest batch of data, the statewide two-week average daily incidence rate was 61.1 cases per 100,000 people.