LOUISVILLE, Ky. — If you test positive for COVID-19, the Kentucky Department for Public Health wants you to quickly call your close contacts. It helps slow the spread of the disease by letting them know they may have been exposed and to quarantine for 14 days since they last saw you.

According to the CDC, a close contact is, “someone who was within 6 feet of an infected person for a cumulative total of 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period starting from two days before illness onset (or, for asymptomatic patients, two days prior to test specimen collection) until the time the patient is isolated.”

Krystal Gray, a registered nurse currently working for Lacuna Health, helps Louisville's health department contact trace. Gray said proper contact tracing is "the right thing to do."

“We’re working together as a community, to reach out, to ensure that everybody stays safe,” Gray said. “It’s the best thing to inform someone, if nothing else, as a precaution.”

Prior to making the call, Gray recommends jotting down what you want to say.

“So they don’t lose their train of thought or they can kind of stay on track for the call. So making a note of information they need to gather from their contact and the information they want to tell them, it might actually facilitate that call going a little smoother,” Gray said.

Nneka Brown has a Master in public health and is also a contact tracer for Lacuna Health. Sometimes, she said, people can feel overwhelmed by having to call close contacts.

“For those people, I always start with, you know, take a breath, and just think of what would happen if you did not notify them, and you waited for them to be contacted, and they are going out and meeting other people. So just have a conversation,” Brown explained. 

Brown said sometimes people can’t bring themselves to make that call. In that case, she said her or another contact tracer for Jefferson County will make those calls for them. 

“So there are some people who just can’t bring themselves to do anything after they’ve realized it, and, you know, I try to meet people at least halfway in that situation,” Brown said.

Brown and Gray said it’s important to gather contact information, like full name, address, and phone number, when you call your close contacts because if your local health department calls you, they may ask for that info to contact trace on their end. 

However, while the Louisville Health Department is still contact tracing, some local health departments in Kentucky are prioritizing contact tracing, or only calling high risk exposures, because they have to focus on calling the growing number of positive cases. 

So if Kentuckians don’t call their close contacts after a positive test, some health departments may still ask positive cases to call their close contacts to ease the burden of calls they are making.

Mark Carter, who leads Kentucky’s contact tracing program, said during the Dec. 1, 2020 COVID-19 briefing to provide this contact card to close contacts when making the call.

“So to other family members or friends, folks that they know they may come in contact with while they were infectious, and then that person can use that card to sort of self manage their own quarantine or self-isolation such that they do their part to help prevent the spread,” Carter said.

CEO of Lacuna Health Brian Holzer said close contacts they reach out to tend to be from a school setting, work setting, or a family member or intimate partner.

“Those are the three largest buckets. So, as a result, there’s a familiarity with who may have been exposed,” Holzer said. So, often times, Holzer said close contacts are called before Lacuna Health’s contact tracers do.

Brown said she has spoken to people who have felt uncomfortable to call close contacts, especially in the work setting.

“They may not have wanted everyone to know that they tested positive, and, for those people, most of the time they went to human resources. Someone who they can tell in confidence, and then human resources would take over,” Brown said.

If you do get a call from your local health department, Brown said it’s important to answer it.

“When I start out my calls, I begin with saying that this isn’t just me asking for a bunch of information about your family, you know, your symptoms, but it’s also trying to see how we can be of service to you,” Brown said.

If you are a resident of Jefferson County, and you or your close contact have questions about COVID-19, such as symptoms, isolating, quarantining, contact tracing, etc., the LOU HEALTH COVID-19 helpline at 502-912-8598 is staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week and has answers.

Kentucky’s COVID-19 hotline is 800-722-5725. It’s operated by the healthcare professionals at the KY Poison Control Center who can provide advice and answer questions.

Additionally, you can reach your Local Health Department in Kentucky by calling 1-844-KYTRACE.