Some Campuses Quicker at Updating Coronavirus Case Counts Than Department of Health

The South Dakota Department of Health is now offering weekly updates on the total number of coroanvirus cases in our K-12 schools and at our universities. Weekly updates… yes, thank you, Pierre, for such up-to-date information to help local policymakers and parents make important decisions.

The current update, giving data through last Saturday, says there were 71 total cases of coronavirus on college campuses around the state.

The University of South Dakota is able to produce daily updates. Their new coronavirus website shows 61 active cases on campus yesterday—60 among students, one an employee. 331 USD community members are self-isolating.

School of Mines shows just three student cases. Sixteen Mines students and staff are quarantining.

Black Hills State counts six self-reported student cases since the start of the fall semester last week and thirteen staff and students self-isolating.

Northern reports 21 total self-reported positive cases as of Monday—seventeen students, four faculty/staff.

SDSU doesn’t have a cootie-count up on its coronavirus website (and I like to think I scan past the toplines a little more than the typical web-surfer… but if readers, if you spot actual data on cases at SDSU, please submit the link in the comment section!), but another page indicates SDSU is at coronavirus threat level Orange. They do link to the Brookings Economic Development Corporation’s covid-19 website, which says nothing about how many are sick or quarantined but does tell us the number of employed workers and jobs available in Brookings County.

SDSU President Barry Dunn says students need to get serious off campus about keeping coronavirus numbers low and keeping campus open:

“The parties, bars—that’s where the major transmission of COVID is, is large groups without social distancing, without masks. Bars in particular are bad. So our student’s own behavior will dictate whether we can stay on campus.”

Dunn says that’s the case for institutions like Notre Dame and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill—campuses that moved online less than a week after students returned. He hopes students in Brookings heed the warning.

“There’s real evidence that if you mess this up, you’re gonna be in mom and dad’s basement for the next six months and that’s not where you want to be” [Jackie Hendry, “Campus Leaders Say Off-Campus Behavior Determines Fate of Fall Semester,” SDPB, 2020.08.24].

Like SDSU, DSU goes numberless… but they seem to think something about the pandemic is going to end on October 1:

Augustana reports receiving 24 positive coronavirus reports from its students and staff since April 23… which number isn’t terribly helpful to people trying to figure out what the trend and risk are right now. Everybody—campuses, elected officials, media—do not report total cases except at the very end of your reports, after you have given the immediate, actionable information. Lead with new cases today, follow by comparing today’s figure with averages for the last two weeks, and then put those figures in the context of thresholds recommended by the CDC and WHO for safe public activities.

Every campus has up-to-date information; publishing that information to help community members make reasonable, evidence-based decisions takes only a click. Some of our campuses are carrying out that duty; the state Department of Health should pick up the pace.