Public Health Update and Fall Semester 2021 Opening

For more information on vaccine incentives, visit the Incentives for Proof of Vaccine Uploads article on Clemson News.

  • Public Health Overview

    Date: August 11, 2021

    • South Carolina COVID trends
    • Vaccination Efforts
    • Modeling
    • Mitigation strategies for University
    • Mitigation strategies for individuals
  • COVID-19 in South Carolina
    South Carolina: New COVID-19 cases

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page.

    South Carolina: New COVID-19 cases in previous 30 days

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page.

    • Peak expected to occur in late-August/September
    • Has potential to reach that of Winter 2021 surge
  • World Data and Vaccine Protection
    Cases: United Kingdom

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page, and in the table below.

    Hospitalizations: United Kingdom

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page, and in the table below.

    Deaths: United Kingdom

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page, and in the table below.

    Daily Peak

    Winter 2021

    Summer 2021 (Delta)

    Cases

    60,000

    47,000

    Hospitalizations

    4,200

    900

    …rate

    7%

    2%

    Deaths

    1,200

    90

    …rate

    2%

    0.19%

     

    • Vaccines are very protective against COVID-19, including Delta Variant
    • While some studies have shown possible waning immunity against mild infection, they also show > 90% protection against severe infection
    • 94% to 99.9% of all COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths are from unvaccinated individuals (KFF)
    • CDC: < 0.01% of Vaccinated Americans developed severe COVID-19 breakthrough case
      • i.e., > 99.99% did not have severe breakthrough infection
  • Vaccinations

    Awareness and promotion campaign:

    • Public Health Team creating material to promote vaccine safety and awareness
    • Working with Communications & student organizations to disseminate material
    • Incentives are being offered for proof of vaccination upload
  • COVID-19 Vaccine Fact Sheet

    image of a flyer covering COVID-19 Vaccine Information. A link to the PDF can be found directly below this image

    COVID-19 Vaccine Clinic (PDF)

  • Vaccinations

    Weekly Surveillance testing

    • Controls peak outbreak size
    • Drastically reduces number of infections
    • Maintains I/Q capacity

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page.

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page.

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page.

    Image of chart covered in detail in the video on this page.

  • University Mitigation Measures

    Pre-arrival Testing:

    • All students and employees at Main Campus and ICAR prior to facility access
    • All residents tested before they move-in and on day of move-in

    Surveillance Testing:

    • Weekly testing for all students and Bi-weekly testing for all employees

    Voluntary testing:

    • Testing available at any point for any individual who wishes to do so
    • Precautionary, potential exposure, symptomatic, etc.

    Contact Tracing and Exposure notification

    • Contact tracers will work to identify and quarantine close contacts of infected person*
    • Exposure notification sent to instructors/students sharing class with infected person
    • Sullivan Center: Reporting system to help identify cluster outbreaks among employees

    Facility Access Locked: For those in isolation/quarantine or those not complying with testing

    • Additionally, noncompliance with testing results in HR case report

    Additional measures: Vaccine Clinics, Vaccine Incentives, Mask Availability in Classrooms

    *Vaccinated people will NOT have to quarantine if exposed to a person testing positive

  • Individual Mitigation Measures
    • Typical incubation period after SARS-CoV-2 infection is 3 to 6 days
    • That is, 3 to 6 days until individual is infections and can spread to others
    • Weekly testing allows us to capture many individuals before they become infectious
    • This is why it is so effective at mitigating disease spread
    • We also have free and unlimited voluntary testing
    • For those concerned about transmitting to others, can test in early morning with results by the afternoon (prior to going back home)
    • Additionally, masks are still very effective and reducing likelihood of infection
    • For those concerned, use N-95 masks or double-mask: layer cloth mask over surgical mask
    • Instructors: Strongly encourage students to wear masks
    • Masks will be provided in the classroom!
    • Get Vaccinated.
  • Teaching Continuity Strategies (Fall, 2021)
    • Based on high majority of possible scenarios, modeling projections indicate low risk of insufficient resources to contain COVID-19 outbreaks


    Teaching Contingency Plan:

    In the event there is danger of insufficient resources to stop possible outbreak, certain courses may be temporarily shifted online

    Communication plan

    • Awareness and readiness
    • Flexibility in assignments, expectations and grading during the peak of I/Q

    Thresholds

    • Dynamics of pandemic constantly changing; giving future threshold not reasonable at this time
    • If projections show danger of not having resources to contain outbreak, we will shift
    • Disease incidence and isolation/quarantine capacity, which are critical for our efforts to mitigate spread, will be closely monitored.
    • In event that emergency mandates needed to be enacted (e.g., temporary shift to online learning), this would most likely occur in first 1-3 weeks of semester.

For more information about the Public Health Overview, contact

Lior Rennert (liorr@clemson.edu). The Power Point Presentation(PPTX) can be reviewed or downloaded from Box.