A staff member at a summer camp in Wayne County, Pennsylvania tested positive for COVID-19, days before the camp’s planned opening.
A counselor at Camp Seneca Lake tested positive for coronavirus during orientation last week, before the children arrived. Despite this, the Honesdale, Pa., Based summer camp told parents it will still open next week.
Leadership informed parents that a counselor had tested positive in a letter emailed to them on Friday, NY Post reported.
“We wanted to inform you of a situation that took place at the camp because of the orientation of the staff,” Camp Seneca Lake said in the letter. “Upon arrival, we re-evaluated the staff and a staff member tested positive for coronavirus when we obtained the results last night.”
The counselor was placed in isolation and sent home the next day. Camp Seneca Lake said counselors who had been in contact with the infected staff member were quarantined for “a few days.”
It appears that possibly infected personnel will not be quarantined for two weeks. Camp Seneca Lake posted on their Instagram account that the camp will open next week. That means it will have taken less than the recommended 14 days to see if counselors show signs of the virus.
Certain counselors were re-evaluated for COVID-19, but the results will not be available until Monday night, the day before the camp opens on Tuesday, July 7.
The camp is located near Pennsylvania’s border with New York State, which means many of its attendees are from out of state. In New York, summer camps were banned this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Pennsylvania summer camps may open amid the pandemic under certain health and safety guidelines established by Governor Tom Wolf’s administration.
Camp Seneca Lake is a Jewish rest camp that was founded in 1974. On their site, they describe the camp as part of the “modern Orthodox Jewish world”, and that many of its campers are children of former campers.
.
