WASHINGTON – Of the 1,022 people who either attended or worked at various summer camps in Maine who implemented measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, only three tested positive for it, says a new study. And those three cases did not result in secondary infections because good measures were taken.
The encouraging news came from a new study released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday. It comes on the heels of another CDC study, released last week, which showed that after child care centers opened in Rhode Island in June, there were few infections and almost no secondary transmission in the surrounding community.
Together, the two studies seem to offer promise. ‘These camps did well. They follow the basic measures for public health, “said Dr. Ashish Jha, a Harvard epidemiologist.
Those measures included “face masks, improved hygiene measures, improved cleaning and disinfection, maximum outdoor programming, and early and rapid identification of infection and isolation,” according to the lead author of the new study, Dr. Laura Blaisdell, a pediatrician at the Maine Medical Center who serves as a medical advisor to the American Camp Association.
CDC Director Robert Redfield celebrated the results. “With a combination of proven public health strategies to slow the spread of COVID-19,” he said in a statement, “campers and staff could enjoy a traditional summer getaway amid a global pandemic.”
Jha contrasted Maine’s approach with that of a camp in Georgia that was lax – it did not need masks or adequately ventilated buildings – and thus became the site of a coronavirus outbreak earlier this summer. That experience doubts the long-term resumption of other daily activities, including school.
The Maine study was especially encouraging for colleges, Jha explained, because in both camps and colleges, young people live and play nearby. “The biggest thing here is that they were aggressive on entry screening,” he said. “It’s really smart, and it works.”
The new CDC study followed participants at summer camps in Maine between June and August. “Approximately 1 week after arrival at the camp, all 1,006 participants without a previous diagnosis of COVID-19 were tested, and three asymptomatic cases were identified,” the study says. “After isolation of these individuals and quarantine of their contacts, no secondary transmission of SARS-CoV-2 occurred.” (SARS-CoV-2 is the official international designation for the pathogen.)
The camps took the kinds of measures that would be difficult in a big city, or even a suburb. “Camps and schools are not the same,” said Blaisdell, who has been volunteering in her son’s camp in her medical capacity for 20 years. At the same time, the camps hosted participants from 41 states and six countries, as well as one U.S. territory.
Some came from coronavirus hotspots, including Texas and Florida. A college could face the same challenging demographic distribution of its incoming students.
Attendees and their families were advised to drive to camp. When they arrived, campers were asked to stay two weeks in their new cohorts and not mix with other children. They were routinely checked for symptoms, with daily temperature checks, and diagnostic tests administered between every four and nine days.
“No participants refuse to test,” says the CDC study, a subtle reminder that public health measures mean little when people refuse to abide by them. The results came back two or three days later. Across the country, people continue to report waiting as long as two weeks to learn the results of their coronavirus tests.
Two adults and one child eventually tested positive, despite no symptoms.
A new CDC guide says people who do not show coronavirus symptoms do not always need diagnostic tests. But people without symptoms can still spread the disease. Dr. Eric Feigl-Ding, an epidemiologist, said Maine’s approach showed what a “wrong move” the CDC was making by leaving the guidance to test asymptomatic people.
If the camps had not done such tests, they would not have found the three people with the virus. Those people could then spread the disease to other campers.
Blaisdell described to Yahoo News what happened when those positive tests were returned: The three sick individuals were isolated while their various cohorts were moved to what they described as a “shadow camp”, excluding other participants. They could still participate in camping activities, but without becoming potential transmitters of the virus. They were also regularly checked.
The strategy was successful. “No cohort members received a positive test result, and all were released from quarantine on day 8 to the positive test result of the asymptomatic camper,” the CDC study reported. “No secondary transmission was identified.”
Blaisdell said keeping children in small, well-defined groups was critical to the success of the camps. “With cohorting, we were able to reduce the spread by children in small, stable relationships.”
The study, which she and four other non-Maine authors published Wednesday through the CDC, describes how “stable, small, segregated cohort camps allowed a wide age range of younger participants to be isolated and quarantined with potential COVID-19 symptoms and exposures while continuing campaigns in other cohorts. ”
Classrooms are natural cohorts. These are also some college arrangements, such as organizations of Greek letters and houses for special affiliation. At the same time, both schools and colleges need to be bound to much more movement in the surrounding community than an isolated camp in rural Maine.
“No one can promise a COVID-free environment,” Blaisdell told Yahoo News, but by maintaining a “culture of compliance,” the camps could have a relatively normal summer.
“We have been singing around the campfire,” she said, adding a warning that could be attached to virtually any human activity in 2020: “It looked different this year.”
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