MADISON, Wisc. (SPECTRUM NEWS) - Ten percent of Wisconsin National Guard members are now assisting the state in its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. That number could increase as the state ramps up testing and its tracing efforts.

More than a thousand of Wisconsin’s citizen-soldiers and airmen have joined the state’s efforts to combat the coronavirus outbreak.

Maj Gen. Paul Knapp, the adjutant general of the state National Guard, said he is prepared to activate even more.

“We haven’t received a specific request yet in that realm, but we’re definitely ready and able to mobilize a significant additional number of guardsmen,” Knapp said in a video conference Wednesday.

Over the last month, National Guard members have collected and distributed protective equipment, worked at election sites and worked alongside health professionals to improve the state’s testing capacity. Guardsmen set up a mobile testing facility at a Sheboygan nursing home and tested almost a thousand people at the Milwaukee County House of Corrections.

This week the guard activated 225 additional men and women to work with health departments as they expand testing and contact tracing.

“This work is all interconnected. tests don’t make a difference unless we have contact tracers to follow up on the results,” said Julie Willems Van Dijk, the deputy secretary of the Department of Health Services. “We can’t test more people without PPE to protect our healthcare workers who are doing the tests.”

At the start of the outbreak, only people with severe symptoms and a doctor’s recommendation could get a test, but DHS is changing those guidelines as more tests become available.

“We’re trying to get the word out to our physician and healthcare partners that the scenario has changed, and that we do need them to test people with mild symptoms,” Willems Van Dijk said.

Knapp said Wednesday a “handful” of Wisconsin Guardsmen have contracted COVID-19 in the last month, but did not offer an exact number.

About 700 Wisconsin National Guardsmen are currently deployed overseas. They have not experienced an outbreak in their ranks, but a stop movement order from the Department of Defense could delay their return or delay future deployments from Wisconsin.