RICHMOND, Va. – Changes are coming to how Virginia health officials carry out contact tracing efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Because there are “substantial” levels of COVID-19 community transmission, the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) is prioritizing contact tracing for certain groups.
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This means not everyone who has COVID-19 will get a contact tracing call. It also means not everyone who is a close contact to someone with COVID-19 will get a call.
The VDH identified the following groups as those who will be prioritized during contact tracing:
- People diagnosed with COVID-19 in the past six days and their household contacts
- People living or working in or visiting congregate living facilities
- People involved in known clusters or outbreaks
- People at increased risk of severe illness
The VDH announced the changes on Monday, which officials say allows them to deploy resources “where they will have the most impact.”
“During this time of significantly high case volume, traditional methods of contact tracing are less effective,” VDH officials said in a release.
Officials with the VDH also announced Monday that Virginia is following the newly-issued CDC guidance for quarantine. While the VDH and CDC still both recommend a quarantine period of 14 days as the safest option, the CDC recently announced two new options for a shortened quarantine. These two options are for those without symptoms after day 10 without testing, and for those after day 7 with a negative PCR test or a negative antigen test performed on or after day 5.
Virginia health officials said they are adopting the CDC’s revised quarantine guidance for everyone except health care workers and those in health care facilities. Residents, staff and health care workers will continue to use 14-day quarantine guidance.
The VDH said nearly 2,000 people have been hired since May to do contact tracing work for the department.