With COVID Spreading In Six Orthodox Jewish Communities, Health Officials Plead For Greater Compliance

The biggest cluster, which spans Borough Park, Midwood and Bensonhurst, has more than 1,600 cases, and nearly 5% of coronavirus tests have come back positive.

City health officials attribute the increase to several factors, including the return to schools, the turn indoors with cooler weather, and the arrival of the Jewish High Holy Days last weekend.

"Before the High Holy Days, we typically as a people come together for more celebrations," said Dr. Mitchell Katz, head of the Health and Hospitals Corporation, the city's lead agency responding to the pandemic. Katz, who is also Jewish, said he grew up in one of the affected neighborhoods and still has family there.

"The opening of schools, especially the yeshivas, have made a difference," he said.

Katz also mentioned people coming and going from other places, such as Israel, as a factor.