Using an Exposure Call Center to Help Mitigate Outbreaks, Such as COVID-19, on a University Campus.

Rapid identification and management of close contacts is an important component of an effective university mitigation strategy for highly contagious infectious diseases such as measles and coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19). Institutions of higher education must plan for an associated large influx of calls that can overwhelm standard student health and local public health operations. In fall 2020, a large state public university's Department of Student Health and Wellness created a dedicated exposure call center (ECC), in close collaboration with the local public health department, to quickly assess students who learned of a COVID-19 exposure outside of the formal contact tracing process. The ECC operated 7 days a week and fielded 3361 calls: 3187 from students and 174 from staff, faculty, and parents. The ECC provided rapid assessment and guidance for students with COVID-19 exposure, allowing for prompt quarantine and medical assessment when warranted. Call centers can increase the bandwidth of university health centers and also reduce the burden on health care providers and other public health resources during periods of crisis or high demand.

Identifying vulnerable populations at a university during the COVID-19 pandemic.

OBJECTIVE: Persons with high-risk for severe COVID-19 illness require special attention when considering university operations during the novel coronavirus pandemic. The objective of this study was to determine the number of students who fall within a high-risk category according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines using linked databases. Participants: Students enrolled at a large public University and who accessed the student health center between 2016 and 2020. Methods: Clinical data were linked with both university student enrollment and disability services databases to provide a comprehensive, de-identified dataset of students at higher medical risk of severe COVID-19 illness. Results: 1902 unique students (14% of the student health center population) were identified as having one or more high-risk condition. Conclusions: Utilizing a large and longitudinally linked student database provides universities with valuable information to make critical administrative decisions about how best to accommodate high-risk students to reduce their medical risk when returning to in-person instruction.

Building-Level Wastewater Surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 in Occupied University Dormitories as an Outbreak Forecasting Tool: One Year Case Study

Congregate living poses one of the highest risk situations for the transmission of respiratory viruses including SARS-CoV-2. University dormitories exemplify such high-risk settings. We demonstrate the value of using building-level SARS-CoV-2 wastewater surveillance as an early warning system to inform when prevalence testing of all building occupants is warranted. Coordinated daily testing of composite wastewater samples and clinical testing in dormitories was used to prompt the screening of otherwise unrecognized infected occupants. We overlay the detection patterns in the context of regular scheduled occupant testing to validate a wastewater detection model. The trend of wastewater positivity largely aligned well with the clinical positivity and epidemiology of dormitory occupants. However, the predictive ability of wastewater-surveillance to detect new positive cases is hampered by convalescent shedding in recovered/noncontagious individuals as they return to the building. Building-level pooled wastewater-surveillance and forecasting is most productive for predicting new cases in low-prevalence instances at the community level. For higher-education facilities and other congregate living settings to remain in operation during a pandemic, a thorough surveillance-based decision-making system is vital. Building-level wastewater monitoring on a daily basis paired with regular testing of individual dormitory occupants is an effective and efficient approach for mitigating outbreaks on university campuses. Building-level wastewater-surveillance, a powerful forecasting-tool when paired with regular testing of dormitory occupants, was an effective approach for mitigating SARS-CoV-2 outbreaks in a university campus.

COVID-19 Isolation and Quarantine Experience for Residential Students at a Large Four-Year Public University.

Rapid identification and management of students with COVID-19 symptoms, exposure, or disease are critical to halting disease spread and protecting public health. We describe the interdisciplinary isolation and quarantine program of a large, public university, the University of Virginia, Charlottesville. The program provided students with wraparound services, including medical, mental health, academic, and other support services during their isolation or quarantine stay. The program successfully accommodated 844 cases during the fall 2020 semester, thereby decreasing exposure to the rest of the university and the local community. (Am J Public Health. 2021;111(10):1772-1775. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306424).