A UW press release shared there are 38 active cases of COVID-19 among it’s students, faculty and staff on August 17. That number grew to 61 as of August 20.
Students, faculty and staff make up 46 of those cases which is 8 more than the August 17 report. Ten students known to have contact with individuals positive with COVID-19 are quarantining. Of the total COVID-19 cases, 15 have recovered.
The university student life and housing is working with Student Health Services and the athletics department to find safe plans to still reach students quarantined to provide assistance and check in said the Student Health Services Director, Mary Beth Bender. Albany County Public Health is also assisting in providing help for students quarantined off campus.
“I’ve kind of accepted the fact that we simply may not be able to maintain the same amount of in person interaction as we normally do, unfortunately,” said Jacob Sonntag, a junior studying economics. “However, for now I have been going on hikes and going to La Bonte park a lot with my roommates. I also try to stay pretty connected to my more distant friends using social media still. A lot of apps have added more features for easier online interaction.”
Bender said the total number of cases looks like a shocking number but that it is more complicated than that.
“Ideally, you want to consider that number as part of the positivity rate, which is a percentage of the number of positive tests out of the total number of tests done,” said Bender. “However, that number of positive cases comes from different sources, some were from the pre-return Vault tests, and we know the total number of those tests done, and some were from people who had symptoms and tested through other means, so we aren’t able to simply calculate that positivity rate given the multiple sources of the positive test results.”
The UW press release shared August 20 said there have been 11,092 tests processed.
Sonntag said he expected the number of cases to be higher due to the size of the school but said UW has done a good job of keeping track of the cases and making him feel like the situation is under control.
“I’m sure it will go up with time too as it’s hard for things to not slip through the cracks but UW seems to be taking lots of different steps to prevent too much spread,” said Sonntag.
Bender said that she is unaware of a max number of cases allowed before campus would be shut down but she does know a number of factors that would affect the decision to close campus. Those factors include whether or not the UW community is wearing masks and adhering to social distancing, hospital capacity, the overall number of cases in Laramie and Wyoming, and COVID-19 related deaths in the community. Bender said she is not a part of the decision on whether to shut down campus or not but that President Seidel makes that decision.
“As we have seen across the country, many of our peers are having to pivot to online environments because of infection outbreaks,” said Seidel in a UW press release. “We believe we have one of the best programs in the nation to monitor and intervene to limit the virus spread, so we can continue to offer a strong on-campus program. It will take the efforts of everyone to execute our plan and have a successful semester while protecting the health of the university and local communities.”
Bender said it is “absolute” that we will have more COVID-19 cases as students return to campus. She is unsure of how many cases will occur but said it all depends on how the UW community and Laramie community in general treat the situation.
“We know, and I have personally witnessed, that many members of our UW community are not following the recommendations for mask wearing, social distancing, and responsible behaviors off campus, and that is what will cause our case numbers to continue to rise,” said Bender.
Sonntag said he expects the number of cases to go up after each phase as students and faculty gradually return back to campus but he said this is a better plan than letting everybody back at once. Sonntag said he is hopeful that eventually there will be some in person aspects of school he can attend safely.
