It’s all about the denominator.
The positivity rate for coronavirus at the University of Idaho is dropping as campus testing expands.
The UI will return to a hybrid of in-person classroom and online instruction for the Fall semester which starts on Monday. All students must be tested before entering the classroom.
UI President Scott Green updated faculty and staff about the effort in an email on Tuesday. Nearly 3,700 hundred faculty, staff, and students have been tested with a positivity rate of just under 1%. That equates to 36 positive tests. Most of the students who tested positive live off-campus and are isolating at home. Five of the students who tested positive live on-campus and are receiving care in the UI’s isolation facility. Green says they are currently processing another thousand samples and will be taking another 3,000 tests next week.
The UI’s first testing report on Friday had a positivity rate of nearly 1.5% from about 2,400 hundred tests confirming 34 cases.
Green’s email informs faculty that they will receive daily report listing which students cannot be in class. That list will include students who are infected and those who haven’t been tested yet and those who haven’t received their results. Those students will be expected to study remotely to begin the semester.
Green told faculty and staff to call campus security anyone on campus refusing to wear a mask.
The UI is operating its own coronavirus testing lab.
https://pullmanradio.com/coronavirus-positivity-rate-drops-at-the-ui-as-campus-testing-expands/