On Monday, Governor JB Pritzker announced the Illinois Contact Tracing Collaborative, part of the Restore Illinois plan.
Contact tracing is a public health strategy that helps to reduce the possible spread of COVID-19 from person to person.
When someone tests positive for COVID-19, Contract Tracers go into action. Trained public health workers and epidemiologists trace who that individual may have come into meaningful contact with over the past 14 days. Contract Tracers then alert those contacted individuals that someone they've interacted with has tested positive. Those contacts are then instructed to get tested, self-isolate, and monitor themselves for symptoms over a 14 days period. The faster this happens, the fewer people that transmit the disease.
The Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) needs your help! In order to effectively trace contacts, IDPH and its partners need to hire a large number of contact tracers across the state. If you're interested in doing this work, please fill out their interest form.
In Illinois, the plan for contact tracing is going to begin in Lake and St. Clair counties before moving across the state. You can learn more about it here.