STA, 15 June 2021 - With new coronavirus infections steadily declining, the National Institute of Public Health (NIJZ) has relaunched the active tracing of contacts of those who have tested positive, which had been suspended in autumn due to an unmanageable inflow of daily cases.
Between 70 and 100 contact tracers will be available each day, Mario Fafangel, the head of the NIJZ's Centre for Communicable Diseases, told the press on Tuesday.
Those who have been in a high-risk contact with an infected person will be notified via the contact tracing app #OstaniZdrav, by the infected persons themselves, or by the contact tracers at the NIJZ call centre.
"We have three tools and as always, the power of these tools depends on the extent to which people are willing to cooperate," Fafangel said.
He described the system as optimal given the current resources, but said it might be worth considering professional call centres in the event of a new pandemic.
Active contact tracing was abandoned in October, when cases started surging to over 1,000 per day. But as Fafangel pointed out, epidemiologists still called every infected person, the difference is that now the tracing will be expanded to high-risk contacts.
