NJ Contact Tracer has not reached everyone who may spread COVID

Credit: (AP Photo / Ben Lonergan)

New Jersey contact tracers were able to successfully contact less than two-thirds of the COVID-19-positive individuals who needed to be tracked in late July, and just over half of those who reached were sick of how they were sick. I was ready to make clear what was spread. The figure shows.

Data released Friday (now included in the state’s COVID-19 dashboard) show that the state has enough labor to track and thwart the new coronavirus epidemic as New Jersey expands its ranks. It highlights the challenges facing contact tracers in order to be empowered. ..

State Department of Health launched multilingual Awareness campaign Last week, encourage the public to respond to contact tracer calls. Tracers do not ask for social security numbers, financial information, or status of immigrants, officials said, and anyone concerned about Tracer’s phone would hang up and call the local health department. Coordinating work and hiring most tracers — and ask if anyone was trying to reach them.

Not participating in this process means “everyone (possibly infected) is unaware that they are infected with COVID-19 and may be infected,” DOH Commissioner Judi Percy Chile said on Friday. She urged people to consider their friends, family and co-workers and avoid “contributing to the prevalence of COVID in our state without our knowledge.”

Exactly how many tracers?

According to the dashboardIn New Jersey, there are 1,344 contact tracers in the state as of August 1, of which approximately 1,000 have been hired through the local health department, which has done most of this tracking work since March. It has been. In the past, state authorities could not pinpoint the exact size of the local workforce, so the total number of tracers was a matter of some confusion.

An agreement that came into effect with the Department of Public Health at Rutgers University in late May recruited 638 people, of whom 349 were trained on modules developed by the school and deployed to support local tracers. I will. The state also hired a public consulting groupA Boston-based company that also oversees contact tracking in New York, Rutgers in what the authorities have described as a flexible, step-by-step approach that allows the state to keep its army growing through fall. To make up for the effort.

“The ability to scale our contact tracking capabilities is important to break the chain of infections, slow the expansion of our communities and resume our economy,” Persichilli said, advancing local public health officials. Admired the work inside.

The immediate goal is to have at least 15 tracers per 100,000 in 21 counties in New Jersey. Currently, the benchmark is concentrated slightly north in 10 counties, with a dashboard showing in Newark City. Once all counties reached this rate, the state said it would try to double the threshold and set up 30 tracers per 100,000. She added that the deployment of new tracers will also be guided by disease progression.

Governor Phil Murphy said Friday that placing contact tracers in these jobs was only “half the equation.” For these processes to work, people need to be involved when these experts call. Demographics weren’t included in the new dashboard’s data, but Murphy said much of the resistance came from young people who might have been infected by attending house parties and other banned events. I doubt it. Murphy warned of large indoor parties and condemned the decision to blame some of these gatherings. Reduce capacity for indoor gatherings last week.

“It’s about public health, duration. Murphy said at his media briefing on Friday. “No one asks any questions other than trying to stop the spread of the virus.”

As of Friday, 184,000 or more State data show that New Jersey people have been diagnosed with COVID-19, with nearly 16,000 confirmed or likely dead from the disease. Authorities reported a surge of new cases in the last few weeks, which seemed to have diminished and hospitalizations and new deaths remained relatively low.

Try to control the spread of the disease

Murphy has been First outlined the plan to reopen State economics and public spaces based on data provided through extensive testing and tracking of pandemic impact. While some question the pace at which the state is launching contact pursuits, Murphy and Persichili stressed how this work is progressing at the local level. According to the dashboard, the state added nearly 100 tracers in the third week of July.

However, state officials did not seem to have a detailed, real-time view of how outreach is progressing among local health departments. According to DOH, a separate agreement with technology company DiMagi has enabled countries to access CommCare, an online reporting platform. CommCare is currently used by tracers in all 21 counties. The software also displays their progress on the DOH throughout the state.

According to the agency, that data is now available on the dashboard, showing the size of the contact tracking personnel where the tracer is located, and the success of the tracer. Information is updated weekly, the state said.

The graph of “Efficacy” shows that in the week from July 26th to August 1st, tracers had contact information for almost all cases, or individuals identified as COVID-19 positive were contacted. Indicates that you have been charged. However, through conversations with these individuals, they were only able to obtain contact information for more than three-quarters of their contacts, or potentially infected people.

Without a phone number, fewer people can be contacted for protection. Due to lack of information, incorrect numbers, and other barriers, tracers have successfully connected tracers with only 63% of infected individuals and 49% of reported contacts, according to the dashboard. Of the infected individuals reached by Tracer, 45% refused to reveal information about their close contacts. As a result, less than half of the contacts identified as potentially infected were notified of the risk.