COVID- 19 cases at Bloomsburg University now total 167; Pitt’s active cases at 50
Mounting COVID- 19 cases at one of Pennsylvania’s 14 state- owned campuses now number 167, with Bloomsburg University Monday logging another 49 student infections, its largest single- day tally and more than triple its total from a week ago.
At the University of Pittsburgh, meanwhile, an updated COVID- 19 dashboard total released Monday evening counts 50 active cases among students, up from 11 a week ago. All are in isolation, as are two employees who also are infected, officials said.
The percentage of total students showing symptoms was not available from Pitt’s COVID- 19 Medical Response Office. Its report said that with move- in complete and remote classes underway, “surveillance testing shows low prevalence among incoming cohorts, which is encouraging,” but it also indicated potential trouble.
“An increase in overall positive cases among students — with a significant portion of those among students living off campus— raises some concern,” the report stated. “Student behavior is going to be the differencemaker in the coming weeks for deciding the trajectory of the residential experience this term.”
Pitt Dean of Students Kenyon Bonner has expressed concern about large gatherings. In recent days, Pitt placed nine fraternities and sororities on interim suspension and barred eight students from coming to campus — meaning they must study remotely — due to unspecified health and safety violations.
The report says 75% of the cases are among students living off campus, and there has been an upswing in the moving five- day average.
“These data likely reflect unsafe social gatherings without face coverings or physical distancing that occurred over the last one or two weeks,” according to the report. “The higher proportion of positive cases among students living off campus suggests that these gatherings are occurring at offcampus locations.”
Bloomsburg officials said 25 of the students are on campus, 133 are off- campus and nine have isolated in their hometown. One employee also tested positive earlier this month and had been in isolation.
On Thursday, a day after Bloomsburg’s total reached 90 infections, the school announced that the campus of nearly 8,700 students was shifting to online nearly all in- person fall classes that had begun Aug. 17. The school also placed a fraternity on interim suspension after it hosted a large party Friday in town that exceeded state guidelines for curbing the virus.
Officials with the university, located in Columbia County, north and east of Harrisburg, have not said what share of its cases are symptomatic or asymptomatic. Its website says there are a limited number of isolation rooms for students not able to isolate at home.
“We are in contact with the Pennsylvania Department of Health multiple times a day,” Bloomsburg spokesperson Thomas McGuire said.
The cases at Bloomsburg far exceed those reported by other schools in the State System of Higher Education, though a majority of them — including California, Clarion, Edinboro, Indiana and Slippery Rock — in Western Pennsylvania shifted most instruction planned for fall online as cases spiked in the state and elsewhere this summer.
Bloomsburg’s numbers also dwarf the total so far reported by the state’s largest public campus, Penn State University, though that school began classes a week after Bloomsburg. On Friday, Penn State reported 31 infections, 30 of them on the main University Park campus of nearly 50,000 students.
PSSHE Chancellor Daniel Greenstein was unavailable for comment, spokesman David Pidgeon said after Bloomsburg numbers were released late Monday.
Mr. Pidgeon said it would be inappropriate to speculate at this time why Bloomsburg has the case count it does.
“What’s important here is that while campus community members are looking to universities to do their part to meet the challenge of this once- in- a- century global pandemic,” he said, “universities are looking to the campus community members to do their part too.
“That means wearing masks, social distancing, frequent hand washing and following university guidelines to protect themselves and each other.”
At Bloomsburg, Mr. McGuire said, “We are testing students who are exhibiting signs of COVID- 19 and also testing close contacts of anyone who tests positive for COVID,” Mr. McGuire said in an email response to questions. “We have a dedicated COVID- 19 testing facility on campus and drive- up testing on campus five days a week.
“We also have partnered with our neighbors, Geisinger Medical Group. In addition to our own testing facility on campus, students have also been tested at Geisinger Bloomsburg Hospital, located across the street from the university.”
Universities across Pennsylvania have deployed varied approaches to testing, some that capture all students as they arrive, a portion while they are still at home and in some cases randomized daily follow- up campus testing.
Mr. McGuire said the students at Bloomsburg were not tested before returning to campus for the fall.
“Knowing that students were negative on arrival would not have ensured that students were still negative even the next day and could have led to a false sense of security,” he said.
“Not all students have been tested in our on- campus testing center, therefore we do not have an accurate number of all students tested,” he added.