The Gila County Health Department has been diligent in both reporting local cases of COVID-19 and contact tracing those that may have come in close contact with a positive case, but the question of how delays in test results affect this process and how they plan on handling possible outbreaks in school remains unanswered.

Stella Gore from the health department told the Arizona Silver Belt that all counties in Arizona are having difficulty receiving test results in a timely manner due to the increase in testing and the labs being inundated with tests to process. “We were dealing with receiving test results seven to 10 days after processing. As a contact tracer that does make our job very difficult. By the time we would receive the test result the positive case would most likely be recovered and quarantining close contacts was futile due to the time lapse,” said Gore.

This past week the health department has noticed a significant decrease in the time it’s taking to receive test results. They are now experiencing a three day average between testing and reporting to Gila County.

According to Gore, if someone test positive the Communicable Disease Specialist reaches out to that individual  and conducts an interview. During the process of that interview, the specialist asks them who their close contacts are. A close contact is someone who is within six feet for 15 minutes or longer. “When we trace close contacts we go back to two days prior to symptom onset or two days before testing if asymptomatic,” said Gore. “The positive case is isolated for 10 days from symptom onset or from date of testing if asymptomatic.”

In order for a positive case to be released from isolation three requirements must be met. The positive case must have 24 hours fever free without fever reducing medication, be 10 days from symptom onset, and have all other symptoms improved. “If you are a close contact you are quarantined for 14 days from the last exposure to the positive case. During that 14 days we monitor to ensure symptoms don’t develop,” said Gore. “If a close contact wants to be tested we recommend they wait at least five days from last exposure to the positive case. This will give the virus enough time to replicate in the system to show up positive on a PCR test. However, you can not test out of quarantine. Should you test negative five days after exposure you cannot leave quarantine until 14 days post exposure while we monitor to see if symptoms onset.”

With the close contact rule of being within six feet of a positive case for more than 15 minutes, how will the health department and local school districts respond to possible outbreaks when school resumes on Aug. 17?

According to Gore, the county is planning on working very closely with all school districts. “It is of upmost importance to keep our children and our community safe. We have had discussions with schools who have reached out to us for assistance in planning ways to mitigate spread before the school year begins,” said Gore. “We are planning on ramping up our staffing to accommodate the needs of the schools during this public health crisis. A lot of our time with schools will be spent providing them with detailed data and lists of quarantine and isolation schedules for students, teachers, and administration whenever possible.”