In Vermont, an immigrant city races to tamp down an outbreak

WINOOSKI, Vt. (AP) — After months of having some of the fewest coronavirus cases in the country, Vermont is now trying to contain an outbreak that has hit an immigrant community in a small but densely populated city.

What health officials described as a small cluster in Winooski that they first noticed on Memorial Day has jumped to 83 cases and expanded into neighboring Burlington and other surrounding communities. No hospitalizations or deaths have been reported.

“It is kind of spreading pretty badly,” said Kamal Pradhan, a Bhutanese American, who said last week he knew of roughly 40 in the Bhutanese community who have been infected with COVID-19.

Harka Khadka, a landlord and community organizer who lives in Winooski and is also from Bhutan, said several of his tenants from Africa also have been infected.

About 40% of the cases have been in children. As of Monday, only 17% of those who tested positive showed any symptoms of COVID-19, Vermont Health Commissioner Dr. Mark Levine said.

Levine said the state's efforts to contain the outbreak through aggressive testing and contact tracing appeared to be paying off.

“Clearly, boxing it in is having an impact,” Levine said Monday during Republican Gov. Phil Scott's regular virus briefing.

But he wasn't ready to declare the outbreak over.

“It is something we are still watching day-to-day,” Levine said. “It's way too early, knowing the incubation period of the virus and the number of people who were involved, to just put a check mark and move on.”

Compared with larger states, Vermont's current outbreak is small. But for several weeks before the Winooski outbreak, the number of new cases reported in Vermont was frequently in the low single digits, with occasional days with no positive cases.

Since late May,...