Cross State Testing and Contact Tracing
| EditDate | 2020/07/11 |
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Related Threads: Currituck County, North Carolina, Virginia, Knotts Island, COVID-19, Care, Competence
I live on an island that is part of North Carolina but attached by road only to Virginia so any services and employment available there is provided by Virginia. That includes medical services. This means during the pandemic we and our EMS team work with Virginia but reporting of COVID-19 flows through Currituck County and North Carolina.
I'm concerned without a national coordination plan information is getting lost and taking a long to to report.
I've worked with the local government officials and helath services and so far have not been able to get any answers to my core questions.
1. How are COVID Testing and Contact Tracking done for Knotts Island residents? 2. If Virginia Beach Medical facilities are used in treating and testing COVID-19 how does that information get into Albemarle Regional Health Services which is where Currituck County has tasked COVID-19 response? 3. With the big military presence in Norfolk providing a large portion of the employment on Knotts Island what coordination is done between the VA and civilian COVID-19 information streams?
Not getting any answers today I sent a letter to the editors of the New York Times hoping with their resources they can point be to cross State coordination in response to te pandemic.Web References https://johnnywunder.info/2021/index.php/Cross State Testing and Contact Tracing
#Care, Competence To the editors of the New York Times,
Do you have any information on how cross State testing and contact tracing for COVID-19 is integrated?
I am a volunteer fireman on Knotts Island (zip code 27950) and am also the Knotts Island Representative to the Fire and EMS Advisory Board (FEAB). Due to the geography of Knotts Island we drive to Virginia Beach for our services including our medical services and that has been a concern during the COVID-19 pandemic. I have raised the concern with #Currituck County officials and at the June 29th FEAB meeting but have not gotten a satisfactory answer. The best response I got from the County officials was that Albemarle Regional Health Services (ARHS) was assigned Currituck and 7 other Counties COVID-19 but checking with Currituck County Health Department branch of ARHS I was told they only did asymptomatic testing and directed symptomatic patients to their health providers. The certainly are not accounting for any negative tests given outside the system and likely are missing all tests done out of State.
Are you aware of any national information standards on reporting COVID-19 tests ensuring cross State results are properly tracked? In a tourist area out of area positives are a key vector and Dare County, also on the Outer Banks, is reporting them and doing contact tracing, do those information standards account for that tracking so though I cannot find them anywhere for Currituck County they are available and someone is analyzing them? How are military cases integrated into the national numbers as the Navy is headquartered in Norfolk and our major employer on the island.
I find the report on 1 positive case for our zip code, 27950, unbelievable given the spike in surrounding Counties and our interaction with Virginia Beach. Could you lay my mind to rest that someone is thinking and working this as we forge through re-opening on the Outer Banks. I'd hate to have the first indication of a problem be the death count.
John S. Wunder