San Francisco launches COVID-19 contact tracing system

The same system used to track a COVID-19 outbreak at a homeless shelter in San Francisco will now be used on a city-wide scale. 

Through contact tracing, public health officials were able to discover a number of coronavirus cases linked to the MSC South homeless shelter. The city's Department of Public Health used the results of two patients who tested positive for COVID-19 and traced them back to the shelter. Authorities were then able to identify people who had been in contact with the confirmed cases and found more than 90 additional cases. 

San Francisco Mayor London Breed said by using the tool on a city-wide level, it will help identify residents exposed to the virus and give them access to the testing and resources needed to keep them and their communities safe.

"Our goal is to chase down all of those people and to either help them if they have COVID-19 and get them into quarantine or basically give them the relief that they are not infected," the mayor said during Wednesday's daily briefing. 

The new contact tracing program will incorporate an app that people living and working in the city can download and use to check-in, and see if they've been exposed.  

It allows for swifter communication, better data tracking, and stronger interventions to reduce further spread of the virus.

Being able to trace the spread of COVID-19 will be critical to reopening the city and region.

"We need to look ahead and plan for how we will eventually go about easing the 'Stay Home Order' while continuing to protect public health," Breed said in a statement. "When the time comes to make changes to the order, we need this contact tracing program in place so that we’re equipped to respond to new cases and keep the virus from spreading out of control."

The city said specially trained outreach workers will engage with people who test positive for the virus and notify anyone who came in contact. 

Case contacts will be able to receive daily text messages or phone calls checking in on their health and symptoms throughout the 14-day monitoring period. They can self-report symptoms through text which will immediately alert public health officials that a follow-up or testing may be required.