#NYC coronavirus tracing head dodges questions on protocol with protesters

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Public Advocate Jumaane Williams walks with protesters as the march on the roadway across the Brooklyn Bridge
Stefan Jeremiah

The head of the city’s coronavirus tracing program repeatedly dodged questions about why people who test positive for COVID-19 are not asked if they attended the mass demonstrations throughout the city over the death of George Floyd.

“The only real way to evaluate everybody at a large event like a protest is to have everybody come in and get tested,” Dr. Ted Long told The Post during a press briefing Tuesday.

“Testing is where tracing begins so from early on with anybody participating in the protests we’ve extended an invitation to come and get tested,” he said.

Workers for the city’s contact tracing program are told not to ask those who’ve tested positive for the bug whether they’ve taken part in the demonstrations due to privacy concerns. Instead they rely on them to cough up the information themselves.

Long added that it’s difficult to target contacts at “large anonymous events like a protest,” but acknowledged demonstrators could be asked about “people [they’ve] been closer to for a prolonged amount of time.”

“Our program will target those people,” he said.

When pressed about why his tracers don’t specifically ask about protest attendance, Long sidestepped the question yet again.

“We do specifically ask that if you’ve been in close contact with how we define close contacts and if you were in close contact with somebody per the evidence-based definition at a protest of course we’ll ask you that now,” he said.

Long said the “evidence-based definition” comes from unspecified city and state Dept. of Health guidelines.

While the city hasn’t yet seen a significant spike in COVID-19 cases since the protests, de Blasio said his concern about a resurgence fueled by the demonstrations is what’s preventing him from committing to a date when the Big Apple will enter Phase 2 of reopening.

We certainly saw an aberrant reality with the protest activity,” the mayor said at his daily press briefing.

“We want to know what that has resulted in terms of the spread of disease, or maybe it hasn’t. We don’t know that yet because not enough time has passed,” he said.

Long also revealed Tuesday that his program is monitoring 4,300 coronavirus cases but only 35 percent of those people are providing names of other individuals they’ve had contact with. He added that many of the positive cases haven’t had contact with other people because they’re following state and city guidance to quarantine.

Just 40 New Yorkers are taking advantage of free rooms in isolation hotels, Long said.