Contact tracing will be conducted by Hamilton Health Box to help prevent the spread of the virus amongst the Pitzer community. In general, contact tracing involves identifying people who have an infectious disease (cases) and their contacts (people who may have been exposed due to close contact) and working with the contacts to interrupt disease transmission. For COVID-19, this includes asking people to either isolate or quarantine.
Contact tracing for COVID-19 typically involves
- Interviewing people with COVID-19 to identify everyone with whom they had close contact during the time they may have been infectious,
- Notifying contacts of their potential exposure,
- Referring contacts for testing,
- Monitoring contacts for signs and symptoms of COVID-19, and
- Connecting contacts with services they might need during the self-quarantine period.
To prevent the further spread of disease, COVID-19 contacts are encouraged to stay home and maintain social distance (at least 6 feet) from others until 14 days after their last exposure to a person with COVID-19. Contacts should monitor themselves by checking their temperature twice daily and watching for symptoms of COVID-19.
