Wednesday, September 27, 2023

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A Mayor and U.S. Senator Sit for a Public COVID-19 Test

By Mark Pazniokas

www.ctmirror.org

New Haven — U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal sat under a pop-up canopy on the New Haven Green, tilted his head back and submitted to a nasal swab for a COVID-19 test today. The moment was a photo op for a media-savvy senator and a public-service pitch for a state promoting testing as it slowly loosens restrictions on commerce.

WestportNow.com Image
U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal gets tested with a nasal swab for COVID-19 by nurse John Grimes on the New Haven Green today. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Cloe Poisson for CTMirror.org

“It isn’t the most comfortable thing to have, in effect, a swab on a stick inserted directly into your nose. It is a a pretty strange and awkward feeling, but it doesn’t hurt,” Blumenthal said. He smiled and added, “And I didn’t cry.”

Testing for COVID has become easier to find in Connecticut, but testing sites still are less elements of a cohesive system than a loose affiliation of hospitals, community health clinics, laboratories and medical entrepreneurs behind pop-up sites, like the one open today on the New Haven Green.

“I think we have a long way to go,” said Mayor Justin Elicker of New Haven.

Letter: Re Staples Graduation ‘Westport is Better Than This’

To the Editor:

I know that these are unprecedented times and that the health and safety of our community is of the utmost importance. However, the current plan for the graduating seniors is simply not good enough. We have all been anxiously awaiting the big plans that have been repeatedly hinted at in emails, to end up with a virtual graduation.

The past eight weeks have been especially hard on the seniors. They left Staples at the last minute for a “two-week hiatus” that turned out to be permanent — not realizing that they would never walk those halls again, never get to say goodbye to classmates and teachers.

My daughter wept as she turned into the Staples parking lot to pick up her lawn sign, seeing the school one last time. They have missed out on so much, on so many memories, on once in a lifetime moments that they will never get back. On top of that, they may not even be able to physically attend the colleges that they all worked so hard on getting into.

Given that our neighboring towns have been able to figure out a way to do something creative and special for their seniors, not simply a “Zoom” graduation, it is clearly not a state regulations issue or even a county issue for that matter.

Westport Restaurants Approved for Outdoor Dining

The Westport Weston Chamber of Commerce says the following restaurants have been approved for limited outdoor dining with another 12 to 15 in the pipeline:

Arezzo Ristorante
5 Riverside Ave
203-557-9375

Bartaco
12 Wilton Rd
(203) 222-8226

The Boathouse Restaurant
521 Riverside Ave
203-227-3399

Calises Food Market
734 Post Road East
203-227-3257

Wednesday, May 27, 2020


Westport Town Offices, Schools, Senior Center, & Library are closed.
9 a.m. – Electronically – Board of Selectmen: live streamed on http://www.westportct.gov, Optimum ch. 79, Frontier ch. 6020. Email to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
3:45 p.m. – 646-876-9923 ID:  89304503634# – RTM Library, Museum & Arts Committee
5 p.m. – 646-876-9923 ID:  83639086759# – RTM Finance & Public Works Committees

Westport Senior Center YouTube Channel
Westport Library Stuck at Home Activities
Westport Library YouTube Page
Earthplace YouTube Channel
Virtual Westport Museum for History & Culture
See more events: Celebrate Westport Calendar

Airborne Visitor to Compo

WestportNow.com Image
A seaplane made a couple of low passes today over South Beach at Compo Beach before landing at least twice in the waters off the jetty. Its mission was not known. In the 1950s, seaplanes landing off Compo and in the Saugatuck River near the entrance to Long Island Sound were a common sight. There was even a hangar on the river to moor the planes. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Meredith Holod for WestportNow.com

Westport COVID-19 Cases Up 7 to 291

Westport’s COVID-19 cases increased by seven at 291 while the number of deaths was unchanged at 22 in the last 24 hours, state officials said today.

There were 27 new fatalities statewide as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, bringing the total to 3,769, Gov. Ned Lamont said. The Fairfield County number was 1,231, up 10.

Statewide hospitalizations declined by 12 to 694 while In Fairfield County, there was a decrease by eight to 225. Statewide cases were 41,303 up 430 while Fairfield County cases were at 15,355, up 142.

Statewide tests administered were 225,362, up 3,636 in the last 24 hours, Lamont said.

Sona A. Current, 91

Sona A. Current of Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, a former Westport resident, died May 22 after an 11-year battle with dementia. She was 91.

WestportNow.com Image
Sona Current: former Westporter Contributed photo

Born Nov. 5, 1928, in Columbia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of Dr. & Mrs. Kevork Aznavorian, she was raised in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. 

She was the wife of the late Robert C. Current Jr., also of Lancaster, where they met in ninth grade at J.P. McCaskey High School in Lancaster. 

She received a B.S. degree from the School of Oral Hygiene at Temple University and also attended Penn State College.

Westport Library to Offer Curbside Pickup

The Westport Library said today it has joined four other Fairfield County libraries to begin curbside pickup of books and other materials as soon as June 15.

The Darien, New Canaan, Ridgefield, and Weston libraries collaborated on this decision, an announcement said.

The Westport Library developed a multi-phased reopening plan in close collaboration with the Town of Westport and the Westport-Weston Health District.

The first phase of the plan includes curbside pickup and a process to safely quarantine returned books and materials, the announcement said.

Too Soon to Tell if Memorial Day Gatherings Will Trigger COVID-19 Surge

By Gregory B. Hladky

www.ctmirror.org

One of the big questions surrounding Connecticut’s pandemic Memorial Day weekend is whether all the beach-going and backyard barbecues will result in a spike in new COVID-19 cases in this state.

But the answer isn’t likely to be known for a week to two from now. That’s about how long it takes for most people to show coronavirus symptoms after being infected, according to Dr. Keith Grant, director of Hartford Healthcare’s infection prevention program.

“If something happens this weekend, for example, based on the incubation period, we’d say that within the next week or two weeks, we’d see some fallout from that,” Grant said Tuesday at the hospital system’s regular briefing

“It’s very hard to put [an exact] time or date on it,” Grant said.