The Merrimack Valley Conference has postponed all sports designated as moderate risk by the DESE and EEA through Oct. 7, in response to having six conference communities identified as “red” in Wednesday’s weekly COVID-19 public health report, issued by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.

The MVC superintendents announced the decision Thursday evening. A designation of “red” means a high-risk for coronavirus transmission.

Dracut, Haverhill, Lowell, Methuen and North Andover joined Lawrence on the map as the six MVC communities, and they represent seven of the MVC’s 11 schools.

Moderate risk sports include soccer, field hockey and volleyball. All competitions will be postponed until later in the fall season and the schools will reassess after next Wednesday’s weekly report.

Because cross country and golf have been deemed low risk sports, those teams are allowed to continue the season schedule. High risk sports football, competitive cheer and unified basketball, as well as swimming and diving, have already been moved to the Fall II (wedge) season, which begins in late-February.

The superintendents jointly agreed on those actions.

“We know that athletics is an important experience for our students and for our school communities as a whole. As such, we are committed to providing opportunities for our student-athletes to participate in interscholastic competitions. However, we must also balance this commitment with our highest priority of keeping our students, staff, and community safe during the current health crisis,” said the MVC superintendents in a statement. “While DESE guidance indicates that we should not make decisions about educational learning models until we examine multiple weeks of data, this recent increase of cases gives us pause for concern in regard to interscholastic competitions as they mix cohorts of students from multiple communities. Simply put, we want to proceed cautiously in order to not put our students, their families, or our communities at higher risk until we know more about the trajectory of the virus in this area.

“We are hopeful that we will be able to continue to have interscholastic competitions among our member schools this fall, and we urge the members of our communities to practice proper health protocols (mask wearing, physical distancing, etc.) so that our student-athletes can have the opportunity to compete.”