USC is dealing with an outbreak of the coronavirus spread in the Greek rank of the university.
The school has detected about 40 positive cases of COVID-19 involving people living on 28th Street, where many fraternity groups associated with the university are located, said director of student health, Sarah Van Orman.
“A significant number of the cases were associated with four fraternity houses,” said Van Orman. To date, about 150 USC students and employees have tested positive.
USC and other universities have adapted to the coronavirus in an effort to keep students, staff, and local communities safe during the pandemic. Many schools, including UCLA and USC, have moved the vast majority of fall semester classes online and canceled events, limited the availability of campus housing to decrease density, added masks, social distancing, and symptom control measures , and regularly reported infections data. Still, as students continue to return officially and unofficially on and off campus, universities face a troubling concern: can the spread of COVID in universities be stopped?
That response depends on the decisions people make, Van Orman said, noting that the recent USC outbreaks occurred in off-campus spaces not controlled by the university.
“Unless we all understand that our only tools right now are physical distancing and wearing masks, we will continue to have devastation, not only in terms of economics, our learning, our academics, our jobs, but also people who die, “she said. “Each of us has to decide what we represent. Frauds need to do that too. “She said that although the outbreak affected fraternity houses, it was not clear that the infection involved fraternity members, who often rent rooms during the summer.
UCLA spokesman Steve Ritea agreed that the cost of the pandemic will depend on the choices of community members.
“If you have three or four of our students living together in an off-campus apartment, all we can do is give you our best recommendation and the best knowledge. They have to make those decisions from there, “he said. Students who live in official UCLA dormitories face certain health restrictions imposed by the school, he added.
Coronavirus outbreaks have occurred in fraternity spaces at universities across the country, including the University of Washington and UC Berkeley. Van Orman attributed the spread in such spaces to the increased household exposure that comes with life situations as a whole and social gatherings.
“When we think about the size of the population they expose, it can quickly become quite large,” said Van Orman.
The outbreak among USC fraternities is almost over, he said. The school first reported 15 positive cases on 28th Street through a July 9 press release. Continuous testing and aggressive contact tracking allowed the university to identify exposed and new positive individuals. The mandatory quarantine ordered by the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health helped stop the spread.
“We haven’t seen more cases in the last week or so,” said Van Orman. Testing, tracing, and quarantine are part of the USC pandemic plan, which is featured on the school website.
In the fall, outbreaks at USC could lead to more remote classes. The hotel space has been reserved for infected students in the future, Van Orman said. The university is encouraging college students not to return, working to educate students about the spread, and is aimed at enforcing strict policies that block campus rules, he added. Preventing students from gathering in groups will play an important role in preventing future outbreaks.
“Meetings are a big problem. Whether in a church or in a fraternity, that’s what we’re seeing: people gather, and if you have 20 or 30 people in the room, you can quickly infect half of them in a meeting, “said Van Orman.
On Wednesday, UCLA’s COVID total was similar to that of USC. The university reported that 153 individuals tested positive and reported their diagnosis to the university since the tests began. 52 cases have been reported since June 15. Ritea said the data includes self-reported cases of students from other states and that the Westwood campus is not experiencing a COVID-19 outbreak. UCLA is not seeing an abnormal spread involving marital spaces, he added.
UCLA has its own COVID procedures written online as well. The intent of the preparation makes Ritea feel better about the school’s prospects.
“When you talk about a global pandemic in which there is still no vaccine, I would never say that any of us feel good about a number of cases,” he said. “But what makes me feel good is that our leadership has taken it so seriously. There has been so much thought, care and planning on how we are doing this, ”he said. However, he noted that planning can only go so far.
“The best we can do is minimize the risk as much as we can,” said Ritea.
The student populations at both schools are full of youth, whom Van Orman acknowledged that COVID-19 generally hits with less force. She said no one infected at USC has been hospitalized yet. But young people are not immune to the worst consequences of the virus, he added.
“We still see young, healthy people who get the virus, who have a serious illness, who are hospitalized and even die,” he said.
He added that a growing understanding of the long-term effects of the virus should concern young people, along with the fact that they can transmit the virus to the most vulnerable people.
“They are exposing their parents and grandparents, they are exposing the person who works at the store,” he said.
