Outbreaks in Colorado schools and colleges rose for a seventh week, while total COVID-19 clusters across the state continued to fall.

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment reported 708 active coronavirus outbreaks in its weekly data update Wednesday. An outbreak is two or more cases linked to a common location or event, and it isn’t considered over until four weeks have passed with no new cases of COVID-19.

The number of active outbreaks dropped in most settings compared to last week, with the biggest declines in long-term care facilities and retail settings.

But new clusters in K-12 schools and universities continued to rise as they have every week since they bottomed out on Jan. 13. That’s not entirely surprising, since it coincides with students returning to classrooms after winter break.

The number of outbreaks in K-12 schools increased by 11, to 147. That’s roughly double the 73 active outbreaks counted on Jan. 13.

The current outbreaks in schools are linked to 274 cases among staff and 1,074 among students, but no deaths. Most school-based outbreaks are small, but six involve more than 40 people.

In the fall, school-based outbreaks initially grew slowly, with new clusters counted in the single digits each week, before taking off as cases statewide skyrocketed in October and early November. Outbreaks appeared to be ramping up the same way in late January and early February, but the number of new ones has leveled off somewhat in recent weeks.

Colorado colleges and universities have 21 active outbreaks, with 15 reported since January. Of those, five are linked to athletics, three to Greek organizations and three to dormitories.

The majority of the 6,666 cases linked to Colorado universities are from the ongoing campus-wide outbreaks that started last fall at the University of Colorado Boulder and Colorado State University. No deaths have been linked to college outbreaks.

None of the college outbreaks declared since January involve more than 50 cases. It remains to be seen if the spring semester will follow the same pattern as the fall semester, during which multiple small clusters preceded campus-wide outbreaks that ultimately infected hundreds or thousands.

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