The Saline County Health Department has issued the following statement concerning isolating and quarantining related to COVID-19.
The CDC announced that officials are shortening the recommended time for isolation from 10 days for people with COVID-19 to 5 days, if asymptomatic, followed by 5 days of wearing a mask when around others.
While the Saline County Health Department is aware of this change, we are bound by the state to follow recommendations set forth by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE). When KDHE issues changes to the current recommendations, they are immediately reviewed by the Saline County health officer for further actions.
The Health Department will release more information as it becomes available.
For now, our quarantine and isolation policy remains the same:
●Cases need to isolate at home for 10 days from the onset of symptoms or test date if asymptomatic.
●Contacts to a positive case quarantine 10 days from the last date of contact, but continue to monitor symptoms for 14 days after exposure. Contacts within a household may have to quarantine 10 days past when the positive case in the home concludes isolation. This will be discussed when a COVID investigator calls them.
●A child who is exposed at school is considered a contact to a case.
●The contact to a positive case is the only one who needs to quarantine. If that child would become infected with COVID then there would be other home exposure. As a contact, no one else needs to quarantine in the household.
●If a contact has been fully vaccinated (2 weeks after the second vaccine) or someone had a confirmed positive COVID test in the last 6 months; recommended they wear masks and monitor symptoms for 14 days after exposure.