The school district’s focus on a successful launch of the school year with gear to prevent coronavirus transmission already on hand tapped the breaks on a campaign to help Cambridge Public Schools students, families and staff order more high-quality masks.

Cambridge may consider a Covid-19 vaccination-or-testing requirement for city employees, ending its holdout position while a stream of other government authorities have announced the same, but not without debate regarding “mandates” from City Manager Louis A. DePasquale.

With evictions expected to swell, Cambridge tenants still have state and local protections to help them stay in their homes during a pandemic – yet one recent case shows how an eviction can take place without that help ever playing a role.

State health officials raised the risk of West Nile virus in Cambridge and 26 other communities on Friday to high from moderate. The Department of Public Health acted after reporting the first infection in an animal this year, diagnosed in an alpaca in Middlesex County.

Another Cambridge resident has died from Covid-19, the first death since May 10. The city reported the death Wednesday, bringing the number of coronavirus fatalities to 124.

Mental health professionals at Cambridge Health Alliance have been leaving recently, in part because of changes to the Alliance’s treatment model, resulting in some patients losing longtime therapists.

Volunteers trying to get high-quality masks into the hands of families with kids in Cambridge schools – and perhaps a broader group of residents – are launching a second bulk-ordering campaign starting Tuesday.

Another public agency in the city, the Cambridge Housing Authority, will require employees to be vaccinated against Covid-19, joining major employers such as the Cambridge Health Alliance, Mount Auburn Hospital, the city’s three nursing homes and two major universities.

Cambridge’s hospitals have now set deadlines for staff to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19, and the city’s nursing homes are under orders to have all their employees immunized by Oct. 10. The city, though, maintains a policy of encouraging but not requiring vaccination for its workforce,

Big increases in the number of people of color living in Cambridge, particularly Asians, fueled a sharp rise in the city’s population between 2010 and 2020, according to U.S. Census figures announced Aug. 12. The total population increased by 13,241, or 12.6 percent, to 118,403.