Contact tracing involves interviewing people who have tested positive and offering them support services. It also means identifying anyone else who has come into contact with them and letting those people know they may have been exposed to the virus. Building programs that do this effectively will take a massive mobilization of resources. Health experts estimate that the U.S.
There’s definitely a training component and we try to start that in the course, giving tips on building rapport and things like active listening. There’s also a lot of training that would happen afterward once you start working with a particular health department, even more on-the-job training. Well, if people don’t trust what’s happening or understand it, then the program won’t be as successful. There is no doubt about that. I think that people who have concerns about these programs have concerns for different reasons. We really need to get at the heart of what people are uncomfortable with and why, and clarify any misinformation that they may have. I think some people really do have misinformation, and that’s part of what fuels their distrust.
There’s this huge effort right now to train and scale up the number of contact tracers. What do we need in place to monitor these programs and gauge whether we’re doing a good job? How do we know that this is working? I guess there’s a misconception that if we trace enough people, we can outright stop this — but that’s just not the case?