UNC Chapel Hill: Chancellor blames off-campus activities for surge in Covid-19 cases; sports to continue



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The university announced on Monday that it was canceling in-person classes for undergraduates after about 130 positive tests in the first week of the semester.

“We had a good roadmap that we developed,” he told CNN affiliate WRAL. “When the activities started to take place off campus and then bring some of it back to the dorms, that’s where we started to see the positive cases and we were surprised at the speed and scale. of the spread. “

Students on campus typically washed their hands, practiced social distancing and wore masks to prevent the spread, Guskiewicz said.

But student body president Reeves Moseley told CNN on Tuesday: “Students weren’t necessarily estranged from society and living up to community standards.”

Distance learning only begins on Wednesday and officials plan to “de-densify” university residences, Guskiewicz said.

Most of the undergraduates in the dorms would find alternative accommodation for the fall, the university said.

The sport will continue

Still, the sports will be played this fall, university officials said.

“We still expect to play this fall, and we will continue to assess the situation in coordination with the University, the ACC, national and local authorities and health officials,” the athletics department said in a statement.

“The health and safety of our student-athletes, coaches and employees, and the community remains our priority,” he said.

Athletes will continue to take online classes and be able to participate in training sessions while following safety protocols, he added.

UNC is a member of the Atlantic Coast Conference, which has announced plans to begin its football and other fall sports seasons the week of September 7.

Moseley, however, asked how the school could tell it was safe to play sports if it was not safe to go to class.

“How will ACC be able to make the decision to bring people to these communities who are already seeing an increase in cases?” he said.

The school’s positivity rate has skyrocketed

The school only has 5.5% capacity for on-campus students who need to be quarantined, its monitoring dashboard says. Out of 73 rooms available on Monday afternoon, only four were available for students.

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The positivity rate among students rose to 13.6% of the 954 students tested in the week that ended Sunday, and five employees also tested positive, according to the Covid-19 dashboard of the university. As of Monday morning, 177 students were in segregation and 349 in quarantine, both on and off campus.

Most had mild symptoms, Guskiewicz and executive vice chancellor and provost Robert A. Blouin said in a letter to the community.

On Sunday, UNC announced a fourth cluster of Covid-19 cases on campus, defined as five or more cases nearby. Two clusters have been identified in university residences, one in a private apartment complex that houses students and the other among members of a fraternity.

Two Oklahoma universities have also seen a significant number of cases.

A sorority at Oklahoma State University is in quarantine after 23 members tested positive for Covid-19, according to the university.
Colorado College in Colorado Springs said 155 students are currently in quarantine for 14 days in a dormitory after a new student arrives on campus and tests positive for Covid-19.

CNN’s Alex Medeiros, Aleks Klosok, and Artemis Moshtaghian contributed to this report.

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