Arkansan tests virus-negative
State quarantines 61 people who were in affected areas
One more person in Arkansas tested negative for the new coronavirus Tuesday and results from another person were pending, a spokesman for the state Department of Health said.
Meanwhile, the number of people in the state placed under voluntary 14-day home quarantines after they returned from affected countries more than doubled, from 29 to 61.
Health Department spokesman Meg Mirivel said the return of college students from countries such as Italy and South Korea in response to concerns about the virus “accounts for a large bulk of the increase.”
The University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, and Harding University in Searcy both announced last week that they were canceling programs in Italy where their students had been attending classes.
UA students who had been studying at programs operated by schools in South Korea also left or were leaving that country last week, a UA spokesman said.
The state Health Department is asking travelers who return from countries designated by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as having a Level 3 or 2 risk designation, meaning the countries have widespread or sustained “community transmission” of the virus, to isolate themselves at home for 14 days.
Italy and South Korea are both designated as having Level 3 risk.
People subject to the home quarantines are asked to avoid being in the same room with another person and to wear a mask and stay six feet away from other people if they are in the same room, Jennifer Dillaha, the Health Department’s medical director for immunizations and outbreak response, has said.
The quarantine subjects are also asked to take their temperature twice a day and check in daily with the Health Department on their condition, Dillaha has said.
The new test result was from the first coronavirus test performed by the department at its own laboratory in Little Rock using a kit provided by the CDC.
Samples taken from two other people in the state earlier were sent to the CDC laboratory in Atlanta and were found to be negative.
Arkansas’ laboratory is also performing the test that was not complete as of Tuesday afternoon, Mirivel said.
She said both recent tests were of people who met the CDC’s criteria for testing.
The criteria includes people with fever or symptoms of a lower respiratory infection, such as cough or shortness of breath, who had contact with a person with a coronavirus infection within the past 14 days; people with fever and symptoms requiring hospitalization who returned from an affected country within the past 14 days; and people with severe respiratory illness that requires hospitalization and has no other explanation, such as the flu.