D.C. has changed a key metric for moving into Phase Three of its reopening plan.

City officials announced Wednesday at a press briefing that the District now is looking for a COVID-19 positivity rate below 5% as measured by a rolling seven-day average, rather than its previous goal of under 10% for seven straight days.

D.C. is currently meeting their own new goal, with a positivity rate of 3.7%.

During the press briefing, D.C. Health director Dr. LaQuandra Nesbitt said that the city made the change because new information points to a lower positivity rate being a key to safely reopen.

“We now have far more evidence that suggests in order for rebound not to occur, for you to have a second peak or a second wave after you turn on more activity, that percentage should be below five,” she said. “If you can keep it below three, even better.”

The city has not shared a timeline for moving to Phase Three, however, and is not yet meeting its goals for other metrics, like transmission rate and the percentage of new cases from quarantined contacts.

The city previously set goals for positivity rates below 20% for Phase One (which was ultimately dropped as a metric for Phase One reopening), and below 15% percent for Phase Two (which was achieved).

Publicly available information from the city in April shows that D.C. had previously aimed for a positivity rate of less than 5% to begin Phase One, though Nesbitt has denied ever indicating that, according to Washington City Paper.

The metric change comes as D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser has taken a number of steps to curb the virus’s spread following a recent uptick in cases, including expanding mask requirements in public and ordering travelers from 27 high-risk states to self-quarantine for two weeks on arrival.

While there continues to be spikes in new cases across the D.C. region, some experts say metrics like test positivity and transmissions rates can actually give a better sense of how the area is doing in terms of containing the virus.

“The DMV region has, relative to many areas of the country, been doing really very well when we’re looking at cases, when we’re looking at our positivity rate, when we’re looking at hospitalizations and deaths,” Dr. Melissa Hawkins, the director of the public health scholars program at American University’s department of health studies told DCist last week. (Disclosure: AU holds the license for DCist’s parent company, WAMU.)

Testing capacity in the region has increased as well, which has impacted overall case numbers. Hawkins suggested watching the positivity rate as a more reflective metric, which she also said should ideally remain below 5%.

Other parts of the region are a mixed bag in terms of test positivity rate. As of Wednesday, Maryland’s positivity rate is 4.8%, while Virginia is at 7.1%, according to state health department data.