College Campuses In Colorado Linked To Coronavirus 'Super Spreader' Events
DENVER (CBS4)- Gov. Jared Polis said Colorado is seeing early warning signs with the rise in coronavirus cases. The spike is being driven by college campuses.
There is a concern the virus will not stay contained to those campuses and could lead to community spread. That is because many of these students work and live off campus.
Cases at CU Boulder doubled from 90 to more than 200 in just one week and more than 70% of those cases are among students who live off campus.
CU reopened for the fall semester three weeks ago. In that time, there have been more than 300 confirmed cases.
On Tuesday, Boulder County issued a recommendation that all local CU Boulder students immediately self-quarantine for two weeks in their campus-area home or residence hall.
The recommendation went on to state: Quarantine is not the same as isolation. It is avoiding in-person interactions with others, monitoring yourself for symptoms and following health precautions.
Students may leave their residences for limited purposes, including in-person classes; to obtain food, medicine and medical care, including seeking COVID-19-related testing; and to exercise by themselves (the Rec Center remains open).
The campus will continue to support students with dining, monitoring, testing, medical care and mental health services. Virtual events and programs will also be offered for students to engage outside of the classroom in the safest way possible.
After that recommendation was issued by Boulder County, the City of Boulder said it will be "issuing an order making quarantine mandatory for certain properties."
Details about the scope of the quarantine and specific addresses will be released on Wednesday.
On Tuesday, Colorado's top epidemiologist said younger adults are driving up COVID-19 cases across the state. The biggest increase is among college freshman and sophomores.
Polis said cutting back on parties will help slow cases.
"It's more about the super spreader events than the person who has it. Science has shown over the last few months, there's no such thing as a super spreader person, there's a person at a super spreader event then it goes from one person to 50 people to 80 people," said Polis.
The state said there have been other outbreaks in schools but it's not as drastic as what is happening on college campuses.
