Efficacy of a student-led community contact tracing program partnered with an academic medical center during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic

Purpose: Contact tracing has proven successful at controlling coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) globally, and the Center for Health Security has recommended that the United States add 100,000 contact tracers to the current workforce. Methods: To address gaps in local contact tracing, health professional students partnered with their academic institution to conduct contact tracing for all COVID-19 cases diagnosed onsite, which included identifying and reaching their contacts, educating participants, and providing social resources to support effective quarantine and isolation. Results: From March 24 to May 28, 536 laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 cases were contacted and reported an average of 2.6 contacts. Contacts were informed of their exposure, asked to quarantine, and monitored for the onset of symptoms. Callers reached 94% of cases and 84% of contacts. Seventy-four percent of cases reported at least one contact. Household members had higher rates of reporting symptoms (odds ratio, 1.65; 95% confidence interval, 1.19–2.28). The average test turnaround time decreased from 21.8 days for the first patients of this program to 2.3 days on the eleventh week. Conclusions: This provides evidence for the untapped potential of community contact tracing to respond to regional needs, confront barriers to effective quarantine, and mitigate the spread of COVID-19.