Penn State puts School of Nursing students in Hershey under 10-day quarantine after COVID-19 cases
All of the Penn State School of Nursing undergraduate students in Hershey have been placed under at least a 10-day mandatory quarantine — largely as a precautionary measure — after a rise in COVID-19 cases last week, the university confirmed.
According to a College of Medicine spokesperson, there were six confirmed COVID-19 cases among nursing students in Hershey last week after they had arrived for their clinical rotations at the medical center. Three other cases were suspected positive, out of a Hershey campus undergraduate nursing population of 144.
The undergrad nursing students will be quarantined until at least Sept. 14. They will be tested this week and, if positive, will face a longer quarantine.
“Because of how quickly the virus spreads, the decision was made out of an abundance of caution to minimize spread,” said spokesperson Megan Manlove, who added patient contact was “extremely limited” because students’ rotations hadn’t yet started. “We’re taking every precaution.”
Both the Hershey campus and medical center remain open after the COVID-19 cases were shown to be “community acquired.” Only the undergrad nursing students, who are largely in their third or fourth years of education, are quarantined and there are no other known active COVID-19 cases among other Hershey students.
The quarantine does not impact the College of Nursing students currently at University Park.
The COVID-19 cases in Hershey were not included anywhere on Penn State’s COVID-19 dashboard, although a University Park spokesperson acknowledged that would be remedied in the near future. Because the College of Nursing is technically part of University Park — even though upperclassmen typically go to Hershey for at least a year — the positive COVID-19 cases were not included within the College of Medicine (Hershey). But, because of the geographic location of Hershey, those cases also weren’t initially included in University Park data, either.
“The cases have already been reported to the DOH,” a University Park spokesperson clarified, referring to the state Department of Health, “and the dashboard team is planning to update, to have a separate report for this specific subset.”
Similar issues have appeared to spring up on the dashboard — eight different campuses have reported between 0-1 COVID-19 test since class started — but a spokesperson said those typically involve smaller campuses that don’t have their own expansive health services. In those cases, tests can be supplied through other means, such as via Vault Health’s mailed tests, and results then typically take longer to find their way back to the dashboard.
Such delays to the dashboard still weren’t well-received by faculty, however.
“It sounds like a breakdown in the intended system,” said Michelle Rodino-Colocino, the president of the Penn State chapter of the American Association of University Professors.
Undergraduate nursing students in Hershey were placed under mandatory quarantine Friday. They can leave for essential services, such as grocery-shopping, with masks, and a majority of the undergrad nursing students live on campus.
The first case among nursing students was identified Aug. 29.
“We’re closely monitoring the situation and providing support to the students as they need it,” Manlove said.
This story was originally published September 7, 2020 at 4:17 PM.
