1/ Hey friends, I want to share a few things about our coronavirus response that haven't gotten much attention. As we cautiously open things up we tend to obsess over case counts (which matter!) and miss the testing and tracing infrastructure that we have been furiously building.
2/ Remember, there were multiple reasons for extreme social distancing. The one we talk about most is to flatten the curve and not overwhelm our healthcare systems. But equally important is buying time to build out our testing and tracing capacity.
3/From the beginning, you've heard me obsess about ramping up testing/tracing as the only way out of this "sledgehammer" approach of everyone staying home and into a "surgical" approach of testing people and then testing/isolating everyone they contacted:
4/Thanks to ARUP, Test Utah and IHC we are 5th in testing/1M people, 6th in positives/test and 2nd in deaths/positive test (the only state in the top 10 in those 3 areas). And, we have 1,200+ staff working on contact tracing (a number we think is the most/capita in the country).
5/ Now, this is the really exciting part...we also finally have much more testing capacity than demand. That means--when combined with our robust tracing capacity--we can finally go on the offense to try and fight this disease. Here is how we are now using those tools...
6/ First, we can now conduct contact tracing w every positive case, attempt to identify the source of the infection (via testing) AND test all asymptomatic close contacts for both the victim and the source. This will help us find sources and exposures before they begin to spread.
7/ Second, to protect vulnerable populations we have assembled 10 mobile strike teams that are being deployed to long term care facilities, underserved communities and other vulnerable populations to significantly increase testing in those areas.
8/ Third, we have begun randomized surveillance testing of 12,000 Utahns, including BOTH swab (PCR) and antibody (serology) tests to help us better understand how widespread the virus has been throughout our state.
9/ Fourth, we are testing all elective surgery patients to protect our healthcare workers. And fifth (not yet started, but soon), we are working to test employees in critical infrastructure and high risk industries (like food processing plants).
10/ All of this is possible because of unprecedented collaboration between health care systems, local health, non-profit and private institutions who have stepped up in amazing ways...AND because of the sacrifice of Utahns over the past 6 weeks. We can do this because of you!
11/ Finally, we have given much deserved praise to our healthcare workers, but I also want to recognize our public health professionals. They have been working around the clock and are often forgotten. Without them, none of this is possible. Thank you for making us proud! /End
