By JULIE CUNNINGHAM
(Franklin County, MA) The weekly town-by-town COVID-19 totals have been released by the state. The disparity between the number of cases in Wendell and Erving vs. Orange and Athol, despite sharing town borders, is high. Wendell has zero confirmed cases of COVID-19 while Erving has just six. Compare that to Orange that has 40 confirmed cases and Athol that has 63. The positive rate for Athol is 5.07%, and for Orange it is 5.56%. In Erving the positive rate is 4.55 and Wendell obviously has a 0% positive rate. Other areas like Greenfield have a positive rate of 10.58%.