Here & Now

DHS Monitors 14 people for Coronavirus in Wisconsin

Public Health Official:

Today, we are announcing the first case of 2019 novel coronavirus in a Wisconsin resident.

Frederica Freyberg:

In our first look tonight, state health officials announced Wednesday that the novel coronavirus had reached Wisconsin, the 12th confirmed case in the United States. The announcement came soon after the Centers for Disease Control, the only lab currently testing for the virus, confirmed the results. While the person’s identity is confidential, local officials held a press conference later Wednesday saying the positive case is in Dane County.

Joe Parisi:

Public health has been busy coordinating city, county and state resources, making sure we were ready in the event this virus presented here. Given what we have seen in other parts of the globe, it’s reasonable to assume today’s news will not be the last positive case we hear about in our region.

Frederica Freyberg:

Tonight the latest on the coronavirus in Wisconsin. We are joined again by the state epidemiologist Ryan Westergaard. Thanks for being here.

Ryan Westergaard:

Happy to be here.

Frederica Freyberg:

So at this hour, what are the latest numbers in Wisconsin?

Ryan Westergaard:

Since we spoke last week, the epidemic of the novel coronavirus has continued to expand globally. I think there were about 14,000 reported cases when we spoke last week. It’s increased to 31,000 now. But in the United States so far it’s been relatively stable. There’s a total of 12 cases, as you mentioned. Ten were in returning travelers and two close household contacts. So in Wisconsin as you mentioned, we had our first confirmed case today and that is one out of a total of 14 individuals who have been under investigation. The results of nine of those individuals have come back negative. We’re still waiting for about four more. So the one case right now is isolated in Dane County and we’re doing all we can to contain the spread further.

Frederica Freyberg:

When do you expect to get results from those other pending cases?

Ryan Westergaard:

They can come at any time. The limitation has really been the fact the test is only being done in Atlanta at the CDC. We learned this week they’ve now manufactured additional test kits and are going to be disseminating that to state laboratories including ours in Madison. That will shorten the turnaround time, we hope. But right now it’s at least a two to three-day turnaround time between the time a patient gets tested and the specimen has to travel and come back. So it could be anywhere between now and the beginning of, middle part of next week before we hear.

Frederica Freyberg:

So there are more of these people under investigation, these kind of pending cases, than there were the last time we spoke. How did they result? Were these people who traveled, who had symptoms?

Ryan Westergaard:

It’s a combination. To be considered a person under investigation — and there’s a specific definition of that — you have to have symptoms consistent with a respiratory virus, which shares many symptoms with influenza and a whole bunch of respiratory viruses we understand much better. Also, you need to have contact to the geographic area where the virus has been spreading or a confirmed case. So it’s a relatively small number of people have met that criteria to actually be tested. Most of them, like I said, we’ve had negative tests so far.

Frederica Freyberg:

How has the state’s response changed now that there is a confirmed case in Wisconsin?

Ryan Westergaard:

We were not surprised when we got the case because like I said, most of the people who were tested had some risk. We were prepared for what was going to happen. So we’re still now in containment mode. What that means is when we hope to identify anyone who’s infected early, which we’ve done. We’ve isolated them, which means get them out of close contact with other individuals to whom they could spread the virus. And then we also have to do some homework in terms of contact investigation to see while the person was ill or shortly before, are there individuals that may have been in close contact that we need to supervise more closely.

Frederica Freyberg:

And you call that a contact tracing? And you have done that with this Dane County person who tested positive, because this person traveled from China, flew into Dane County Regional Airport, then went directly to the UW Hospital emergency department. And so describe specifically kind of the contacts that you’re trying to trace down that this person may have had contact with?

Ryan Westergaard:

Yes. This is a tried and true method in public health. Some people call it shoe leather epidemiology. It involves close interview with the patient, understanding their travel history and like you said, the places around town they’ve been. We have a pretty strict definition of what constitutes a contact or a contact that has some risk. So during the period where the person was — before they were diagnosed and had illness, we go to see have health care providers been in contact with them, have household contacts been in contact with them. In the setting of air travel, there’s protocols in terms of people who would have been within six feet on the plane. Those people get notified that they were a potential contact and then they get evaluated in a standardized way, get offered testing if they have symptoms.

Frederica Freyberg:

Have those people been contacted at this point?

Ryan Westergaard:

That’s standard procedure. Those are underway. Because it’s a long trail potentially for all these cases, a lot of individuals, sometimes these efforts get coordinated by various jurisdictions, including the state, local health departments and also nationally, the CDC, particularly when it involves travel between several states.

Frederica Freyberg:

What should the public know about this?

Ryan Westergaard:

Well, our message continues to be, and we believe this strongly, that right now the risk of people getting sick with coronavirus is very low in the community. But we are in the middle of respiratory virus season in general and we happen to have had a bad week in terms of influenza. Our respiratory virus team at the state releases their numbers and there were a total of 3,000 individuals in Wisconsin alone in the last week who tested positive for influenza. So influenza causes a comparable illness to the novel coronavirus and right now is a much greater threat to the public than the novel coronavirus. So our message, what people should know about, is let’s do our best to be informed and prepared for the new virus, but don’t forget all the things we know how to do to prevent the spread of viruses we know about and influenza is the most important of those right now because we seem to be approaching the peak of the influenza season right now.

Frederica Freyberg:

There’s a couple different strains of influenza out there as well, right?

Ryan Westergaard:

That’s right. Influenza is a tricky virus. It mutates on the fly, which is why we need to have a new vaccine every season, because it changes. And it’s also true the vaccine is never perfect because of the way that the virus changes. But we have enough information to know that, on average, if everyone got the influenza vaccine that was approved for this season, we would cut down the number of cases substantially. So that’s still our recommendation for people who haven’t gotten their flu shot yet, to go out and get their vaccine as soon as they can.

Frederica Freyberg:

But meanwhile, unlike the influenza that you had these peak numbers of this week, you are able, you’re hopeful, to contain this coronavirus in this community.

Ryan Westergaard:

That’s still our goal and what’s — the difference between where we are in the United States with the containment response is very different, what’s going on in China, which is really a mitigation response. There they have sustained transmission in the communities. That’s what we’re doing our very best to prevent from happening here in the U.S. and here in Wisconsin. So far the pieces are in place and the system is working. So we’re going to stay at it.

Frederica Freyberg:

Great. Thank you very much. Ryan Westergaard , appreciate it.

Ryan Westergaard:

Happy to be here.

Frederica Freyberg:

For in-depth reporting on coronavirus in Wisconsin and additional information, please visit our journalism partners at WisContext.org