COVID-19 Contact Tracing in Canton

By Julie Goodman, PhD, Chairman, Canton Board of Health

Although you may have never known, the Canton Health Department has been contact tracing for decades. Contact tracing involves finding people who have been in contact with a person who has been infected with a pathogen, monitoring or quarantining those people, and repeating the process if they, too, are positive. All of the information obtained from contact tracing goes into a large database so that the spread of infections can be tracked.

Julie Goodman

In the past, the focus in Canton and other areas has been diseases like tuberculosis, influenza, and hepatitis. Now we and others in Massachusetts and around the country are primarily focused on coronavirus infections and COVID-19. In Massachusetts, contact tracing is being accomplished through local health departments, and this is augmented by the statewide COVID-19 Community Tracing Collaborative.

It may sound simple and straightforward, but contact tracing requires people with training, supervision, and access to social and medical support for patients and contacts. Tracers must help patients remember everyone with whom they were in close contact when they may have been infectious, and then contact those contacts quickly. Time is truly of the essence. Contacts are informed they may have been exposed, but not by whom, to protect patient privacy. Tracers then spend time with contacts so they understand their risks and what they should do to monitor their own health and prevent spreading the infection to others even if they don’t feel sick. The identity of contacts will also be confidential.

If possible, tracers will also check in with contacts to be sure they are self-monitoring their health and checking for symptoms. For the coronavirus, this means contacts should be checking their temperature twice daily and watching for cough or shortness of breath. If a contact does become ill, a contact tracer can help with medical care.

Contact tracing will play a big part in preventing the spread of the coronavirus and helping us get back to normal. It may allow us to start socializing and opening businesses because people who have the virus will be able to separate themselves.

If you are contacted by the Canton Health Department, it is very important you answer. As the numbers in Canton continue to rise, you may instead get contacted by contact tracers whose phone numbers have a prefix of 833 or 857 and who will be identified on the caller ID as the “MA COVID Team.” Whether or not you have been contacted, if you develop symptoms, it is critical that you isolate yourself and contact your doctor so you can be evaluated for infection and the need for medical care.

This pandemic has shown how essential public health practitioners are. In Canton, in addition to contact tracing, our head nurse, Cindy Bonner, has been working tirelessly to organize the logistics of COVID-19 testing, distribute personal protective equipment (PPE), and coordinate many community health response initiatives.

Please do your part to help the Health Department and everyone else in Canton working to stop the spread of the coronavirus by washing your hands (for 20 seconds) throughout the day, maintaining a social distance of at least six feet whenever you can (wear a mask if you can’t), and staying home if you are sick.

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