Virginia halts contact tracing for all COVID-19 cases, focusing on cases in high-risk settings

The Virginia Department of Health is radically changing its approach to contact tracing.

On Monday afternoon, VDH announced that instead of investigating every COVID-19 case and tracing all contacts, the department will now focus on tracking outbreaks and cases in high-risk settings, such as as long-term care facilities and health care. settings.

[Virginia sees 10,699 new coronavirus cases Tuesday, 84,590 new cases in the last week]

One of the reasons given for this change is the prevalence of the omicron variant of COVID-19.

“Omicron is now the most common variant of COVID-19 and is spreading so rapidly that it is neither possible nor fruitful to track every case. Thanks to effective COVID-19 vaccines, most people infected with Omicron have mild disease. However, Omicron is causing a very high number of cases and, due to the sheer number of cases, is straining Virginia’s healthcare system,” according to the VDH press release announcing the change.

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Since September 2020, Virginia public health personnel have conducted more than 750,000 case investigations, notified more than 400,000 close contacts and responded to more than 6,500 outbreaks, according to VDH.

VDH said it will continue to partner with K-12 schools on prevention strategies to reduce the spread in schools so schools can stay open and safe.