Consistently wearing a mask, practicing social distancing, and washing your hands reduces risk. If everyone on campus adheres to this practice, then risk is low. Risk is everywhere during a global pandemic. Everyone needs to adhere to socially responsible choices and follow guidelines for their protection and the protection of others.
Students and employees should monitor their temperature every day prior to arriving on campus. Residential students should check each day prior to leaving their room. If their temperature is 100.4 degrees or higher, they should stay home and seek health advice from their provider.
According to DHEC, symptoms of COVID-19 include shortness of breath, coughing, fever of 100.4 °F or greater, chills, repeated shaking with chills, muscle pain, headache, sore throat, and/or new loss of taste or smell. If you are experiencing symptoms or are sick, do not go to work or class. If you become ill while at work or in class, go home or to your room immediately and contact your healthcare provider.
For employees, notify your supervisor and contact LeeAnn Pounds (poundsl@winthrop.edu) in Human Resources, Employee Diversity, and Wellness for additional information and instructions. For students please initiate nurse consultation through the Patient Portal. Regardless of where testing occurs, students must notify Health Services of a positive test by calling 803/323-2206.
It is important to act as if everyone may be infected and consistently practice these preventative behaviors:
If a person is experiencing symptoms consistent with COVID-19 or has had close contact with someone who has been diagnosed, they should call their healthcare provider. If they do not have a provider in the area that can administer a test, they can visit the DHEC website to check for mobile test sites in the area or permanent testing locations. Students experiencing symptoms can initiate a nurse consultation through the Patient Portal. Health Services will offer appointment based diagnostic tests to students who meet criteria. The $15 charge will be applied to their student account.
Winthrop is working closely with the local DHEC team on testing/contact tracing plans for the fall. A positive COVID-19 test is a reportable condition. Community providers who administer the COVID-19 test are required to report positive results to DHEC. Health Services will report positive cases to DHEC to initiate contact tracing. DHEC has a rotating team of epidemiologists who work 7 days a week to conduct contact tracing. Upon notification of a positive case, they will contact the individual to gather information about who they were in close contact with for 15 minutes or longer within 6 feet and where those contacts occurred. DHEC first attempts contact through calling or text. If no response, they send a letter stating DHEC needs to speak with them.
You will no longer be considered infectious when all of these conditions have been met:
**Note: If you have not experienced symptoms but have tested positive for COVID-19, you may discontinue isolation when at least 10 days have passed since the date of your positive COVID-19 test result as long as you have not become ill during this 10-day period.
Quarantine lasts 14 days starting with the last day you were in close contact with the individual who was confirmed to be infected with COVID-19. If you don’t know when your last contact was with the infected individual, your quarantine period will last 14 days from the date of notification to quarantine. If you live in the same housing area as someone with COVID-19, the quarantine period will last until 7 days after that individual is no longer in isolation (i.e. 17 days). You must complete the full duration of quarantine.If at any point during your Quarantine Period you begin to feel ill with fever, cough, shortness of breath, sudden onset loss of taste/smell, sore throat, headache, diarrhea, nausea/vomiting, chills, or muscle pain, you need to immediately take the following actions:
Winthrop is recommending that members of the university community receive a flu shot when it becomes available. Influenza (Flu) and COVID-19 are both contagious respiratory illnesses, but they are caused by different viruses. COVID-19 is caused by infection with a new coronavirus (called SARS-CoV-2), and flu is caused by infection with influenza viruses. Because some of the symptoms of flu and COVID-19 are similar, it may be hard to tell the difference between them based on symptoms alone, and testing may be needed to help confirm a diagnosis. The CDC believes it’s likely that flu viruses and the virus that causes COVID-19 will both be spreading this fall. In this context, getting a flu vaccine will be more important than ever. CDC recommends that all people 6 months and older get a yearly flu vaccine. Please contact your pharmacy for flu vaccine availability. For a $25 charge to student accounts, Health Services offers a quadrivalent flu vaccine for students.