UH contact tracing trainees want to help Hawaiʻi’s communities

Excerpt taken from University of Hawaiʻi News:

By the end of this week, the University of Hawaiʻi–Hawaiʻi State Department of Health (UH-DOH) Contact Tracing Training Program will have trained nearly 450 qualified individuals who will be available to be activated by the DOH, as needed, to trace known contacts of COVID-19 positive cases throughout Hawaiʻi.

Track 1: Contact Tracing for Clinical Healthcare Professionals, a 1.5-day training course, trained a total of 393 individuals after its completion on July 17. Track 2: Community Contact Tracer Training,
a six-week course available year-round for those with bachelor’s degrees without necessarily having a clinical health background, will graduate 49 individuals from its first cohort on July 24.

Aimee Grace, UH System lead and director of the UHealthy Hawaiʻi Initiative, reiterated the university’s appreciation to the community for all of the volunteerism and support. “We remain incredibly grateful to every person that has stepped up and reached out to be part of the UH-DOH Contact Tracing Training Program,” she said. “Together, we will help to support the DOH in its contact tracing needs to best address the COVID-19 pandemic while building critical health workforce capacity for Hawaiʻi’s future.”