Athletes at a suburban high school are being told to self-quarantine after three dozen students tested positive for coronavirus in recent days.
According to a press release from the Lake County Health Department, 36 students from Lake Zurich High School have tested positive for coronavirus, and as a result officials are asking all participants of the high school’s athletic camps to self-quarantine for 14 days.
“We are grateful to the leadership of Lake Zurich District 95 for assuring proper health screenings were done at their athletic camps last week, because those measures helped identify this cluster of COVID-19 cases,” Dr. Sana Ahmed of the Lake County Health Department said in a statement.
According to officials, Lake Zurich High School began holding athletic camps on July 6. During the intake prospect at the camp, multiple students were turned away during health screenings because they had symptoms of COVID-19, and other students began experiencing symptoms during the day and were sent home.
The next day, all camps at the school were closed until further notice, and case investigations and contact tracing efforts were launched to determine the spread of the virus.
In all, 36 students have tested positive for the virus so far. Officials say that the students contracted the virus after attending the camp, or possibly after attending social gatherings in recent days.
After the first round of initial test results were confirmed, officials with the Illinois Department of Public Health contracted with a private company to run a mobile testing site at the high school on Saturday. More than 350 individuals were tested throughout the day, according to the Lake County Health Department.
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The mobile testing site will once again be active on Sunday, with testing available to students and staff of the school from 9 to 11 a.m. in the Performing Arts Center parking lot.
Testing will be conducted for the general public between 11 a.m. and 5 p.m.
Officials are warning students and faculty of the school that a negative test doesn’t automatically rule out future infection, as it can sometimes take up to two weeks after exposure for symptoms to develop, or for a positive test result to be returned.
For more information, community members are encouraged to visit the Lake County Health Department website.
