From Aug. 30 to Sept. 5, the third week of fall classes, 188 Auburn students or employees reported testing positive for COVID-19, according to the University's COVID-19 Resource Center.
This number marks a further decrease from the first and second week of classes, where 424 and 360 cases, respectively, were reported to the University.
The University requires all current students, faculty, staff and third-party contractors working on campus who test positive for the novel coronavirus to complete a confidential Self-Report Form. Submitting this form enables the University to begin contract tracing to help reduce exposure to those on campus.
During the same week, from Aug. 30 to Sept. 4, the Auburn University Medical Clinic reported 80 positive COVID-19 tests of 717 taken for a positivity rate of 11%, which is 6 percentage points lower than the week before.
The positive cases from the Medical Clinic are separate from the COVID-19 Resource Center's number of cases, as the Med Clinic also tests patients who are unaffiliated with the University whose positive cases are also included in their reported numbers. Auburn students and employees who test positive at the Med Clinic are encouraged to complete the University's Self-Report Form.
As of Sept. 7, the University has administered 16,634 doses of COVID-19 vaccines. The University is in phase 3 of its vaccination distribution plan, which expands inoculations to University retirees as well as family members and dependents of University employees who are ages 12 and older.
Students in on-campus housing who have tested positive are required to either leave campus or move into isolation housing in Hall M in the Hill for 10 days. On average, 18 residents were in isolation housing per day last week.
On-campus residents who were exposed to someone with COVID but have not tested positive themselves are required to quarantine. Residents in the Hill, Cambridge and Quad residence halls are relocated to quarantine housing in Hall M, which is separate from isolation housing, while residents in 160 Ross, the Village and South Donahue residence halls are able to quarantine in place in their assigned room.
Last week, an average of 4 students were in quarantine housing per day, while an average of 3 were quarantining in place per day.
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Trice Brown, senior in english language arts education, is the multimedia editor of The Auburn Plainsman.
