Oregon State University expands coronavirus prevalence study to Newport, June 16

By Steve Lundeberg, OSU release – NEWPORT, Ore. – TRACE-COVID-19, the groundbreaking Oregon State University project to determine community prevalence of the novel coronavirus, is expanding to include two days of sampling in Newport on June 20-21. The addition of Newport to the study follows the positive tests of more than 120 workers at Pacific Seafood, which operates five processing facilities in the city. In Newport, the TRACE-COVID-19 project will include the collaboration of OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center, the OSU Extension Service and the OSU College of Public Health and Human Sciences, which will assist local health officials with contact tracing for any positive tests that might result from the TRACE sampling. TRACE-COVID-19 stands for Team-based Rapid Assessment of Community-Level Coronavirus Epidemics. Oregon State’s work in Newport will complement other sampling, testing and contact tracing assistance being given by health officials from Tillamook and Clatsop counties. “Being true to the rapid designation and purpose of TRACE, we are pleased to be able to nimbly and rapidly respond to help inform the Lincoln County response to this acute COVID-19 outbreak,” said Javier Nieto, dean of OSU’s College of Public Health and Human Sciences and one of the TRACE-COVID-19 project’s principal research investigators. “Additional data is critical to plan and adapt to this pandemic and any future health crisis that our coastal communities may face,” said Kaety Jacobson, chair of the Lincoln County Board of Commissioners. “OSU has always been a trusted partner, and this is another great example of that partnership working to address our community needs.” In Newport, university researchers will collaborate with Lincoln County Health & Human Services. “The results from the TRACE team’s community sampling will give the community current prevalence data and inform a better picture of how COVID-19 moves through rural communities,” said Bob Cowen, director of the Hatfield Marine Science Center. “It’s impressive that OSU is able to provide the TRACE team within Newport this quickly. I am pleased that HMSC will serve as the TRACE team’s base of operations this next weekend.” The idea of TRACE is to take a team-based and community-based approach to rapidly assess coronavirus prevalence, said Ben Dalziel, assistant professor in the College of Science at OSU and co-director of the project. “It’s important to collaborate with Lincoln County health officials and the Newport community to better understand what’s happening in real time with the virus on a local level,” Dalziel said. Newport’s population is 10,600, comprising roughly 20% of the nearly 50,000 people who live in Lincoln County. TRACE-COVID-19 began in Corvallis the weekend of April 25-26 as a partnership between five OSU colleges and the Benton County Health Department and continued the subsequent two weekends. The fourth weekend of sampling had originally been scheduled for May 16-17 but was rescheduled by TRACE leaders to June 13-14 to help determine if relaxing stay-at-home orders led to a jump in the prevalence of the virus in the Corvallis community. COVID-19, first reported to the World Health Organization on Dec. 31, 2019, has been confirmed in more than 7.8 million people worldwide and killed more than 430,000 people. In the United States, there have been more than 2 million reported cases – including more than 5,300 in Oregon – and more than 115,000 deaths nationwide. Lincoln County has had 198 confirmed cases and zero deaths.