EVERETT, Wash. — It started with a stubborn cough. A visit to an urgent care facility. A test being sent off to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And then a 35-year-old resident of Snohomish County, Washington, being named the first confirmed case of the coronavirus in the United States.
For Bruce, it was a relief to learn that the patient lived alone, that he took the stairs rather than the elevator to his office, and that he did not work in an open cubicle. At the Snohomish Health District, the staff of 113 has poured 1,000 hours into coronavirus control since the patient’s test was sent to the CDC over the Martin Luther King Jr. weekend. Food inspectors, human resource managers and opioid outreach specialists have pitched in.
His symptoms were relatively mild. But health officials wanted to monitor him for fever and to make sure he had any supplies he might need so he did not need to leave his house.When Curtis knocked on his door the next morning after picking up a thermometer at a pharmacy, he answered wearing a face mask. He promised to text her his temperature every few hours.But before the next one, Curtis called him with Spitters on the line.
The novel nature of the coronavirus added urgency — and a disquieting uncertainty — to the work. Who is most at risk? How soon do symptoms arise in people who are infected? How, exactly, is the virus transmitted?