WORCESTER, Mass. – Some area hospitals are changing their masking polices with cases of COVID-19 on the rise in Massachusetts.   

Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester said they don't have a mandate, but staff is masking in clinical areas. 

UMass Memorial Health said because of a dramatic increase in employees testing positive for COVID-19 over the last two weeks, they're now requiring caregivers to mask up when working with patients in all licensed clinical areas.

"We're seeing higher increase of employees who are sick, of people in the hospital who are sick, so we are seeing a lot more people getting sick and some people, employees, feel pretty awful,” said Dr. Richard Ellison, an epidemiologist at UMass Memorial. “But we are not seeing people going straight to the intensive care unit, so this is not a replay of 2020 or 2021."

UMass Memorial said mask use is encouraged for patients and visitors but is not required. If transmission rates increase, they could expand the requirements and they'll re-evaluate the mandate in a month.