Craven County issued the following announcement on Mar. 27.
Fourth COVID-19 Case Confirmed in Craven County
The fourth case of the Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) has been confirmed in Craven County. The individual who tested positive for COVID-19 is an adult who recently moved to Craven County from out of state. This individual was tested on March 25, 2020 through the drive-up COVID-19 test site at the Craven County Health Department and that test was sent to the North Carolina State Lab of Public Health. This confirmed case was reported to the Craven County Health Department on Friday, March 27, 2020 by state health officials. The individual has been in isolation since symptom onset and is recovering at home. Craven County public health officials have been in contact with this individual since notified of the positive test results this afternoon.
Craven County Health Department’s Communicable Disease staff is working to conduct contact tracing to make sure everyone who came into close contact with this individual is quarantined. Close contact is anyone who was within six feet of the individual for 10 minutes or more. Contract tracing works by interviewing the individual to identify all places the person went while symptomatic and determining who the person came in close contact with. For example, identifying those individuals can include talking to employers to identify employees the person came in close contact with as well as looking at store and restaurant cash receipts to see customers the person may have come into close contact with. The Communicable Disease staff will make every effort to notify those they can identify who came into close contact with the person who tested positive and those individuals will be instructed to quarantine at home for 14 days.
While Craven County has had four confirmed positive COVID-19 cases, two of those individuals have recovered and are out of isolation and the third is doing well and is expected to end isolation March 28, 2020. No positive test cases resulted from the 14 tests completed at the drive-up test site on March 20th and 23rd. Further test results are still pending from the drive-up clinic held on March 25, 2020
“All of the positive COVID-19 cases thus far have been travel related and at this time, is a good indicator that Craven County does not have community transmission. I would like to thank the residents of Craven County for following social distance guidelines and for staying home to reduce the risk of catching or spreading COVID-19. While we do not see that we have community transmission at this time, this is not the time to stop being cautious,” stated Scott Harrelson, Craven County Health Director.
Residents who feel they are symptomatic and in need of testing need to call ahead to their primary care physician to receive instructions for how to proceed. Anyone who is symptomatic should not just present at a medical provider’s office without calling ahead first.
There are other upper respiratory illnesses present locally, the seasonal flu and it is allergy season which can also produce similar symptoms. There is no data to support that Craven County has community transmission, the four confirmed cases in Craven County are travel-related.
Craven County Government COVID-19 updates will appear on the Craven County website at www.cravencountync.gov, on the Craven County Facebook page @cravencounty and the Craven County Twitter account @cravencountync. Residents are also encouraged to register to receive notifications via the Craven County website and to register to receive emergency notifications via text, email and phone calls through the CodeRed Emergency Notification System.
For more information on COVID-19, please visit the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website at https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/about/index.html and the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services Division of Public Health website at https://ncdhhs.gov/coronavirus.
Original source: https://www.cravencountync.gov/CivicAlerts.aspx?AID=321
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